A Beggar in Evening Dress 


BY 


GEORGE ELLIOTT FLEMING 


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1 ? 


A Beggar in Evening Dress 


BY 


GEORGE ELLIOTT FLEMING 


LI^ARY of WNGKESs] 

Two Copies rtecttiviju 

APR 28 1908 


ciooyii£iii tiitry 

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COPY B. 

II I II Ip ■iiiimr ei' i a 


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Copyright 1908 by Thomas W. Ftkming. 


A BEGGAR IN EVENING DRESS 


BY 

George Elliott Fleming. 


I. 

‘ ^ Billy is an ass. ^ ’ 

‘‘He certainly is.^’ 

These complimentary remarks, made not with- 
out that stamp of atfection that often goes so in- 
congruously with their like, were the utterances 
of a pair of comfortable loungers before the big 
open club fire. As I appeared before them, they 
jumped up quickly, and one grasping me in a play- 
ful manner by the throat, demanded, 

“Agree with us, and don’t carry tales!” 

“Your remark is certainly just,” I laughed as 
I seated myself between them, and wondered what 
foolish thing Billy had been doing now. 

I had first known him at College, whither he 
had gone without a so^u marquis, but with a plen- 
tiful supply of brazen nerve and ready wit. His 
modest apartment there I can see well, and I shall 
surely never see another like it. It contained, as 
nearly as I can remember, six articles. A cot, a 
washstand, a puritanically plain table, a type- 
writer upon it, a straight backed chair before it, 
and a smooth board nailed into the corner, where- 
on rested in peace some twenty or thirty volumes, 
those which were not the property of college and 
public libraries being selections from the private 
stock of Billy’s friends. It was not splendid, but 


2 


it was picturesque, from the tender memories of 
what occurred there. 

Billy had a very peculiar habit as to rising in 
the morning. Not being in a position to issue in 
vitations to breakfast at the club, he issued no 
invitations. But while his bed room was neither 
luxurious nor gorgeous, it was a popular place to 
‘‘stick your head in.” So Billy lay comfortably 
between the sheets and waited for a caller. The 
caller came, was relieved of the price of a break- 
fast, and departed, wishing Billy well. If he was 
extra hungry, he sometimes waited for the 
“Second call for breakfast.” 

Sometimes Billy lost his friends, though this 
was seldom. He was careless enough on one 
occasion to ask a newly-made acquaintance who 
was going to pass the Public Library, to drop in 
as he passed and leave a book for him. The 
librarian collected one dollar and twenty-three 
cents in overdue charges from the newly-made 
acquaintance, and Billy was forced to fill his place 
in his affections with another friend. 

In those days every one said Billy was promis- 
ing. He is promising still. It would warm the 
cockles of many a heart to have Billy fulfill some 
of those promises. 

“What’s up now?” I queried. 

Dag Morrison lit another cigarette and looked 
into the fire disgustedly. 

“Grot arrested, the darned fool,” he answered, 
“and thought it was a great joke, because in all 
his varied experiences he had never run acroTss it 
before.” 

“Was it a joke?” I asked. 

“No, sir, it was a sad reality,” he replied. 
“Absolutely unjust, though,” he continued, warm- 
ing up,“ accused of pocket picking, when he was 
only doing a charitable act. I tell you, Joe, if the 


3 


Good Samaritan performance took place to-day, 
the Good Samaritan would be arrested on sus- 
picion of being the thief with whom the poor devil 
fell in.^^ 

The story, as I gleaned it, was this. Billy met 
a friend the night before, at an hour when good 
little boys ought to have been in bed, in a hope- 
lessly intoxicated condition. He urged him to go 
home to bed, and the comrade, when the light of this 
sound reasoning broke over him, hailed a cab and 
dragged Billy into it. At the door of the hotel, 
Billy bade him good-night, and went home with 
the satisfaction of having done a charitable act. 

Next morning, the recipient of Billy’s advice, 
after looking for a pitcher of ice-water and a 
towel, proceeded to look for a roll of money in 
company with which he had launched out into the 
dizzy maze the night before. He found no 
currency, and a hasty consultation with somebody 
followed; thereupon, as Billy was perennially 
broke, he was arrested on suspicion. He waived 
a preliminary hearing, and gave bail for his ap- 
pearance in Court. 

‘^Well,” said I, we ’ll have to stand by 
Billy. I’m surer of his honesty than I am of my 
own. ’ ’ 

‘^Why my dear boy,” exclaimed Dag vehement- 
ly, ‘Gf all the world said Billy took what wasn’t 
his, they’d never get a man to believe it that knew 
Billy.” 

'H’m afraid,” chimed in Burton Matthews, 
'Ghat Billy will see a chance to get rich by suing 
the fellow for false arrest and injure his reputa- 
tion.” 

The beautiful part of this unique experience 
w^as that numerous checks and kindly aid came in 
unasked. He even censured himself for never 
thinking of it before. Not a friend of Billy’s 


4 


would have stopped at bankruptcy to save him^ 
for this strangely improvident, careless youth 
made friends that held to him with a loyalty that 
wealth cannot command. He acknowledged them 
all with thanks, and put many by for a rainy day. 
It rained almost every day with Billy. 

In the gallery of the court-room were numerous 
picture hats and pretty faces. Near the bar sat a 
young man of perfect form and physique, fault- 
lessly dressed and full of life and vigor. Pres- 
ently the clerk called out, ‘‘William Carrolton to 
the Bar!^^ 

Billy approached with dignity. 

“You are charged with the robbery of five hun- 
dred dollars from the person of one Malcolm Per- 
kins on the night of January 10th. How do you 
plead, guilty or not guilty P’ 

“Not guilty,” he replied, softly but firmly. 

The Court peered over his desk, and asked in a 
kindly voice, 

“Have you no counsel!” 

“I believe,” said Billy, “that the Laws of the 
State of New York allow a man to plead his own 
case. I wish to avail myself of that privilege.” 

The prosecution put in its case without an ob- 
jection from Billy. It was a new world to him, 
and he took a deep interest in it all. He had been 
well coached, told when to object and when to 
except, but it is improbable that he would have 
known an objection if he had met one face-to- 
face. He revelled with delight in the position he 
occupied, the position that was made invincible 
only by a knowledge of his own innocence and in- 
tegrity. 

The first witness for the State was Mr. Perkins, 
who was dressed for the occasion in a neatly fit- 
ting business suit and a look of offended dignity. 
He carefully followed the story outlined for him 


5 


by the Statens Attorney, and spent some thirty 
minutes building up a formidable case, without 
any of the expected interference from Billy. 
Finally the State ’s Attorney turned to Billy, say- 
ing, ‘^He is your witness. 

Billy had a sudden chill, then awoke to the 
situation. 

‘‘How was I dressed when you saw me, Mr. 
Perkins!” he asked. 

“I — 1 don’t exactly remember,” stammered 
the witness. 

'‘Did I sit down at your table, or did I remain 
standing while I spoke to you!” 

“I don’t remember.” 

“Can you swear positively, of your own knowl- 
edge, that you saw me that night!” 

“I think I can.” 

“Prom whom did you gather the facts about 
our conversation and relation that you have testi- 
ded to!” 

“Prom a number of persons.” 

“Not from your own remembrance!” 

“No.” 

Billy paused a moment. 

“Mr. Perkins,” he demanded, eyeing him 
viciously, “you say that you have no recollection 
of seeing me on the night in question, that as to 
my personal relations with you on that night your 
mind is a blank!” 

“Yes,” blurted out the complainant. 

“If your Honor please,” said Billy, turning to 
the Court, “I move that all the witness’ tes- 
timony, except the first two statements, that he 
had $600 before he met me, and that he had noth- 
ing the following morning when he became sol3er, 
be stricken out.” 

“Motion granted,” announced the Court. Billy 


6 


dismissed the witness with a flourish. The cab- 
man was sworn and seated. 

‘‘What do yon wish to prove by this witness?” 
asked Billy. 

“That yon pnt the complainant into a cab at 
tfwo o’clock in ithe morning and rode home alone 
with him while he was known to have the money,” 
said the State’s Attorney, 

“We admit all that,” replied Billy. “Bring 
on yonr next witness.” 

The next three witnesses took the same excur- 
sion. They were waiters who had seen Perkins 
that night with a large roll of money. One wished 
to testify that Perkins had exposed it in Billy’s 
presence, when Billy said that he wished it to 
appear as part of the record that he had never 
seen Perkins without a large roll, and that he had 
had an unusually generous amount of it with him 
on the eventful night. 

“Slow up, young man,” interposed the Judge, 
“you’ll get a chance to give your story by-and 
by.” 

The prosecution had no further witnesses to 
call, it had made no case, and the complainant 
was very sorry that Billy had not stood a pre- 
liminary hearing and been dismissed. But Billy 
had not been willing to see a charge dismissed 
that held so royal an opportunity for strange and 
stirring scenes. The State’s Attorney arose and 
said, “The State rests its case.” 

Billy looked at his notes. He read there, ‘ ‘ The 
defense also rests.” He had been studiously 
coached for the trial and urgently advised to 
avoid the witness chair. But his mind was work- 
ing fast, and rather than miss the big show, he 
would take a vacation up the river. 

He took the chair in apparent ease, though his 


7 


heart was throbbing fast. Facing the jury, he 
said slowly: 

‘‘My name is William Carrolton, of 53 West 
59th St., New York City. On the night of the 
10th of January, or rather at two o’clock on the 
morning of January 11th, I met the complainant 
in this case, Mr. Malcom Perkins, in a cafe with 
a very large amount of liquor inside of him. I 
was absolutely sober; he, as much intoxicated. 
In pulling out tips for waiters and lackeys, he 
also pulled out a large quantity of money — how 
much, I do not know. I forced him to put on his 
coat, sign his check, and go home. He insisted on 
a cab — indeed he was unable to go it on foot — 
and I entered one with him and we together rode 
as far as the door of his hotel. There I left 
him. What I want to testify to is this : on several 
occasions, he has to me accused others of robbing 
him when he was drunk. His accusation of me 
was as ill-founded as the others.” 

“I object,” interrupted the State’s Attorney. 
“The e^ddence is wholly inadmissible.” 

The Judge looked kindly at Billy. He gave him 
full credit for his ignorance of the law. 

“I must strike out the last remark,” he said; 
“but I will allow you to say that his accusation 
of you was wholly false.” 

“That is all,” said Billy, and started to leave 
the chair. 

“Wait a minute,” interrupted his opponent, 
“I have a few questions to ask you. What is 
your business?” 

“I have no business,” said Billy. 

“You must have some means of livelihood?” 

“I suppose that you might call me a soldier of 
fortune,” he replied. 

“That means that you live by hook or crook?” 
continued the attorney. 


8 


‘‘Will you please take care of that question, 
Judge? asked Billy, turning to the Court. 

The Judge unsuccessfully tried to restrain a 
smile, titters were heard in the galle'ry, and the 
Statens Attorney proceeded without waiting for a 
ruling. 

“Did you ever try to borrow any money from 
Mr. Perkins he asked. 

“I did.’’ 

“Recently?” 

“About two weeks ago, but I didn’t get it. 
There isn’t a charitable or a humane bone in his 
carcass.” 

The State’s Attorney was mad. The Judge did 
not try to restrain his mirth this time, and when 
he had restored order, the attorney asked to have 
the answer stricken out. The Judge did not laugh 
now. 

“You have made the witness your own,” he 
said. “You have gone into new matter, and you 
cannot have your own testimony stricken out.” 

The State’s Attorney started to argue with the 
Court, but evidently considering it lost time, de- 
sisted to level his guns again at Billy. 

“Then if you thought him so mean, why did 
you ask him for money?” he ventured. 

“Three weeks ago,” Billy hastened to narrate, 
“hearing that I was hard up, he offered to lend 
me three hundred dollars. But he was very 
drunk, and I refused it because I considered it 
was not his own act. That was why I waited till 
he was sober, and then gave him the chance.” 
Then he added, ‘ ‘ He was sober one day. ’ ’ 

The State’s Attorney thought a moment, and 
then started on a different tack. 

“Haven’t you been particularly hard up,, 
lately?” he asked. 


9 


do you expect to prove by that!” de- 
manded Billy. 

“That you needed money so badly as to get it 
at any cost.” 

Billy sat foi*ward in his chair. He was not act- 
ing now. He was in deep and dangerous earnest. 

“It’s a long jump from honorable poverty to 
crime,” he said. “I’m guilty of the first. You’re 
here to prove me guilty of the latter — if you can. ’ ’ 

Billy was told that he might begin on the jury, 
and he jumped into it heartily. 

“Gentlemen of the jury,” he began, “The 
State’s case reminds me of a trial I once had the 
pleasure of attending down in Southern Indiana. 
A young lawyer stood before the Court speech- 
less. After an undue amount of time thus wasted, 
his mouth slowly opened, and he said, ‘Gentle- 
rben, when I came here this morning, only my- 
self and God knew my speech. Now, only God 
knows it.’ That, gentlemen, is the exact condi- 
tion of the State’s case. If they had any evidence 
against me, only God knows it, I don’t. And it 
further appears that they don’t either. With the 
intention of doing a noble, honorable act, I made 
myself amenable to what my opponent will call 
the doctrine of exclusive opportunity. I certainly 
had the chance to rob him, but it’s a far call from 
a chance to a desire. I believe it is the law that 
you must find that I robbed this man beyond a 
reasonable doubt. If you can do it from the evi- 
dence they have produced, gentlemen, I congratu- 
late you.” 

So many reasonable doubts existed on taking 
the first ballot, that Billy was soon victor in his 
first case at law. 

In a few moments, he was whirling up town in 
the automobile of a friend with his admirers all 
about him. He made a hasty mental calculation 


10 


of the rainy day fund, and concluding that a vic- 
tory that was not worth celebrating was not worth 
having, he invited the whole party to lunch. This 
was not without precedent, for whenever Billy 
cornered a little money, he made a charming host. 
He had the distinct advantage of being born a 
gentleman, but it was one of his wise beliefs that 
it was better to be a gentleman by occupation if 
one were not so by birth, than to be born one and 
leave it for another occupation. Billy stuck to his 
job through thick and thin. He did not proceed 
on the anarchistic theory that the world owes 
every man a living, neither did he define the life 
of a gentleman as one of leisure and commanded 
homage. 

The last time Billy had dined at Sherry’s, he 
had found it necessary to ask the waiter to hold 
the check a few days. Unfortunately it had not 
been taken care of, and when this same gargon 
saw Billy enter with half a dozen pretty girls, and 
with five young gentlemen known to have healthy 
fippetites — when he saw them walk deliberately 
to his exclusive domain, and when — ^oh miser- 
ahile dictu — he saw Billy wave them to their 
seats with knightly dignity, he had all in one every 
disease that deprives one of the power to move. 
For Billy, in one of his feasts of riches, had saved 
this waiter’s little baby and its mother when hos- 
pitals were only for those who could pay. So 
there was no question, ever. What was his, Billy 
could have ; but unfortunately, on the day before, 
Shorthose had slipped down to third place, and 
the dreams of a 20 to 1 shot had left the waiter 
high and dry. 

Billy ordered a wonderful dinner. He looked 
at the next one through a celestial telescope, and 
even then its magnitude was questionable; and 


11 


after all, it might not be a fixed star. So he lived 
in the present and let the future take care of itself. 

“Joe, said Billy to me when we were seated 
and the dinner was ordered, “What kind of a 
lawyer do you think I’d make?” 

“A greater than Blaokstone,” I assured him. 

“Well, if the girls will promise to look after 
getting me clients,” he said, “I think I’ll give it 
a try. How do you think this would do for a 
sign: ‘Broken hearts mended here?’ ” 

“Lawyers don’t mend broken hearts,” ob- 
jected Helen Sawyer. 

“They have to get up at seven o’clock in the 
morning,” interposed Marion Lewis. 

“They have to starve ten years before their 
practice begins to pay,” put in Percy Gray. 

“Then I’ll give it up,” said Billy. “It’s out 
of my line anyway. Not artistic enough for me. 
Besides, I couldn’t think of forcing a pretty 
woman to tears who was only trying to get rid of 
a brute of a husband. I’ll have to find some more 
congenial way of making a living.” 

“Wlien you find it,” suggested Max Thomas, 
“Let me know.” 

“That’s cruel,” cried Margaret Matthews. 
Turning to Billy, she said soothingly, “They 
don’t even know how to treat their host.” 

Billy paid no attention. He drew from his 
pocket an old frayed pocket book, ripped and 
torn. While he busied himself with a fountain- 
pen, he passed the pocket book to Thomas, saying, 

“See if there’s any money in that.” 

After a few moments of industry, Thomas 
passed it back, with the remark that he couldn’t 
find anything in it. 

“Then nobody can,” retorted Billy. “If there 
had been anything in it, it wouldn’t have got by 
you. ’ ’ 


12 


The laugh was on Thomas as the dinner ar- 
rived. The atmosphere of the repast was a 
merry one. Billy was an ideal host. That sub- 
ject on which he could not converse with well- 
informed interest, does not exist. He had a 
wonderful library, on which he had paid one 
dollar down, but constantly arriving additions 
never let the payment get any farther. But 
though some sets had held but temporary 
ascendancy upon his shelves, he made it a point 
to find out what was new and startling with them 
in the early part of their sojourn. 

Only one small accident occurred, and that 
came from an adjoining table where a mischiev- 
ous small boy who had been a close student of 
Buster Brown had pinned his grandmother 
gown to the table-cloth; and that dear old lady, 
feeling a spectral clutch behind, started to run 
in consternation from the scene. The table had 
been almost cleared — Dei gratia— and fortu- 
nately it was only a glass of clean water that 
made an assault upon Billy. Billy accepted the old 
lady’s sincere apologies for her wayward charge 
most graciously, went through a drying operation, 
sat down and laughed. 

‘ ‘ Don ’t you consider that a bad omen T ’ he was 
asked by one of the girls. 

“No,” said Billy, “Not nearly as bad an omen 
as if it had been, for instance, a custard pie. It 
only reminds me of an experience.” 

“Let’s hear it,” they echoed. 

“I was in AVashington one day,” he began, 
“when a friend of mine in Congress had a call 
from a Western constituent who was fresh from 
the hay-mow. The farmer liked Washington and 
the gay life of the Capital, and made it absolutely 
impossible for his official friend to refuse to 
invite him to a fashionable dinner the night after 


13 


his arrival, which the Congressional friend was 
giving. A dress-suit was rented, but he refused 
to let any barber tamper with his whiskers. 
The beauty and elegance of the dinner-party 
dazzled him. The representatives of foreign 
powers were there with gold lace and spangles 
which he did not understand. He found himself, 
in the allotment, seated beside a wondrously 
beautiful woman. He became very much excited, 
and finally developed into a state of fright. 
Such does beauty and grandeur inspire in the 
novice. Oysters came and went. Uncle Heuben’s 
went because he couldn’t get them out of the 
shells. They were fastened in. He also had 
trouble remembering which glass his water was 
in. An actual canvass took some minutes. 
When the soup came, he took the biggest spoon 
he could find and pitched in. He manipulated 
badly — the coat pinched under the arms. And 
much to his disgust — though, be it said, not to 
his mortification — the spoon flew away, and 
narrowly missing his beautiful partner’s ear, lit 
just behind her chair. With remarkable alacrity, 
Uncle reached for it, but in the act, lost his 
balance. To save his life he grasped the cloth 
and pulled himself into just the proper position 
to receive the hot soup upon a part of his head 
where the hair was extremely rare. The diners 
were interrupted for a moment, to hear him yell 
from his place beneath the table, ‘Oh Hell, I wish 
I hadn ’t come ! ’ ” 

“And so you wish you hadn’t come?” he was 
asked. 

“Not at all,” he replied. “You can only 
interpret me that way by accrediting me with 
Uncle Eeuben’s capacity to judge dinner-parties. 
Besides,” he said, looking at a marvellous beauty 
beside him, “I’m not frightened by pretty girls.” 


14 


The dinner over, the party arose and walked 
into the corridor. Then Billy went back to find 
his waiter. He received the bill from a trembling 
hand, though if the waiter had anything to say, 
it stuck in his throat. He looked over the check 
critically and found at the bottom that the proper 
addition was $54.60. 

‘‘Old man,” he said without producing any 
money, “You held a check for me a couple of 
months ago.” 

“Yes, Mr. Carrolton.” 

“How much was it?” inquired Billy. 

“Too much to lose,” was probably what he 
thought, but he said instead, “Twelve forty, sir.” 

Billy handed him a hundred dollar bill. 

“Take it all out,” he said. 

The waiter actually jumped for joy. The 
twelve forty, he had seen taken out of his own 
wages two months before, but he knew that 
Billy’s chickens would all come home to roost 
some time. 

Billy bade his friends good-day, and started 
out to walk and think. In all of his poverty, his 
ups and downs, he never grew morbid; but he 
craved long walks in solitude, to think undis- 
turbed. Often I was honored by being called on 
to accompany him. He had that inherent quality 
that makes great men, great statesmen, great 
nations. He believed that all men were good, 
were honest, were true. The skulking class whose 
like he had bested to-day only because he himself 
was above reproach, had no right to be counted 
in any estimate of men. His faith in men had 
never wavered, though he had a comical view on 
the subject, which after all, was nearer right 
than wrong. 

Charity exists in inverse proportion to wealth. 
This was his general rule. He was not a conceited 


15 


man, and did not malm this rule for his own bene- 
fit, though if it were applied to him, it would 
declare him the most penniless man on eartli, 
and likewise the most charitable. And I cannot 
say that that honor was not his. 

“If I’m broke and you have a dollar, Joe,” he 
would say, “I know that I can have half of it. If 
I need it bad enough, by Jove, I can have it all. 
Isn’t that so? It’s the same if I have it and you 
want it. Now, whoever in the world could smoke 
enough dope to dream of a friend going to Harry 
with his forty million dollars, and getting a million 
on the plea of saving his life? It’s absurd to tliink 
of it. Here you or I will give our all, a clear one 
hundred per cent. If Harry gave any man a 
hundredth of one per cent., he would resign from 
some club or other, or give up some trip till he had 
made it back. 

“Who is SO able to put himself in a hungry 
man’s place or sympathize with him, as a man who 
yesterday needed a dinner he didn’t get, or per- 
haps is hungry to-day? All in the world a man 
actually needs is protection from hunger, from 
exposure, bodily discomfort and want. If a man, 
being provided with safety from all these things, 
has still more from which he bestows charity, he 
is giving away that which he does not need. If 
every rich man could be absolutely penniless, 
homeless, starving and desperate, after he has 
been wealthy, for just one week, and then have all 
his wealth restored to him, we would have a dif- 
ferent world. 

‘‘If anybody gets a high honor, or makes a large 
stake, it’s a rich man. If anybody gets arrested 
on suspicion of stealing somebody’s money, it’s 
some poor devil that hasn’t enough to buy a cup 
of coffee. Rich men don’t have to take chances, 
and poor men have to stick their poor bedraggled 


16 


heads into some noose every day. This pillar to 
post business makes me want to be rich some- 
times, but honestly, when I look at some of the 
rich men I know, and see bow they have changed 
since they were decent poor men, why, hang it, I 
am satisfied to be poor the rest of my days.^^ 

I said Billy was not morbid. This kind of argu- 
ment on his part was a continual one, but it did 
not indicate in him an unhealthy mind. He merely 
was fighting against the insidious forces that try 
to make a poor man bitter against the world, dis- 
contented with his circumstances and surround- 
ings, and which have no healthy outlet. These 
ideas, if men accept them, make only misan- 
thropes, and misanthropes make ciiminals. 

I went home with Billy and sat down to muse 
with him before a cheery open study fire. I have 
said that he was satisfied to be poor, but he really 
was not. He had a secret hope, one that I am 
sure I was the only one that ever heard. Billy 
believed that he had within himself the power to 
write. And many a night, before that study fire 
he wrote till the morning sun peeped in. The 
magazines seemed to be able to go to print with- 
out him, however, and he had a bountiful supply 
of those printed slips, whereon the editor does not 
wish to imply that your work lacks merit, but 
simply that for the particular uses of this magi- 
zine, it is unavailable. Billy’s record of these re- 
ceipts was unbroken. Many a man would have 
become discouraged, but not Billy. He had that 
quality which is the very surest beacon of success 
at last. 

His present task was to spend the remainder of 
his newly-acquired wealth. It once occurred to 
him to repay the part of it which he had 
not used; but on second thought he decided that it 
would take far too much brain-work to pro-rate 


17 


the proper amount among his benefactors. The 
rainy day theory too had been laid by. Why 
should he, an expert in meeting rainy days and 
coming off victorious, change his tactics with re- 
gard to them? Besides, out of sight, out of mind. 
Bainy days, begone ! 

Billy’s home deserves mention. It was not like 
the Cambridge work-shop. In fact, one would 
pronounce it extremely characteristic of Billy. It 
was comfortable and cosy. It had an air poetic 
and artistic. The walls were lined with books, on 
which, as I said before, Billy had paid one dollar 
down. But their very selection did credit to 
Billy’s taste. There were no books there whose 
duty it was to ornament the shelf but who had no 
story worth while to tell inside. I glanced at the 
shelves, and turning to Billy asked. 

Where’s the English set that was in the cor- 
ner?” 

^‘Man came for them yesterday,” he replied. 
^‘By the way, Joe, you don’t care if I subscribe for 
them in your name over again, do you? I need 
them a couple of months longer.” 

I laughed, and Billy needed no further answer. 
I only wondered if Billy could trace the circuitous 
route my name had taken if he tried. 

A study table occupied the center of the room, 
on which were sketches of Billy’s work. Among 
the pictures which looked down upon him from the 
wall were two dainty drawings which he had done 
himself. A roomy couch and plenty of easy chairs 
provided lounging room and a tea-table in the 
chimney corner held all that was necessary for a 
light repast. 

A good landlord was not the least of Billy’s 
blessings. Many times he had thought his time 
was up, but he had stayed the man with golden 


18 


pramises and a ‘‘rare g^ood outlook/’ and so the 
crisis had passed and Billy remained. He had 
never been in so deep as now, and he meant to 
make himself solid forever by paying in advance. 
It was preciously rare that he had the good for- 
tune to do this, and now he meant to make a name 
for himself. 

‘ ‘Six months ’ back rent and three months ’ ahead 
will pay me up to May first, ’ ’ he said. ‘ ‘ Old Sol- 
omon can’t ask any more before Fall, anyway. 
Electric lights been off two nights now. Have to 
pay them up. Plague take that laundry company ! 
I’m going to get a new laundry where they won’t 
hold your stuff up. Got a little bill over at the 
Club where Tom gave me a card last month. 
Have to pay that. Think I’ll lay aside two-fifty 
for clothes. Shame to have to pay for ’em, isn’t 
it? Now that brings me down to the books.” He 
took a note-book from a drawer. “Here’s eight 
sets where you have to pay one dollar down, and 
twelve where you have to pay two dollars. I have 
to have them all. By the way, Joe, I think Mug- 
gin’s Magazme is going to print that Burgundy 
story of mine. Gee whiz! That makes only 
twelve dollars left ! ’ ’ 

I wanted to call him a fool, but somehow, it was 
never possible to call Billy so. He did the most 
assinine things with a childlike straight-forward- 
ness, tried your patience clear out, and yet through 
it all, you had to love the boy. Here he was, after 
a feast of riches, broke again ! He seemed to mind 
it a great deal less than I, and expect it as a matter 
of course. In fact, he accepted a little money as 
a rare good joke. 

Now as for myself, I am pretty nearly as poor 
as Billy. But I make it a strict rule to keep a lit- 
tle money in reserve, to have a five-dollar bill 
carefully tucked away in an inside pocket, which 


19 


is only for emergency, and to spend only a cer- 
tain fixed percentage of what I earn. In this way, 
1 may find swimming hard against the current, 
but my head will be above water. Billy, I have 
known to go two weeks without a single penny in 
his pocket, and he was as happy as a lark. 

^^Joe,” he inquired, ‘‘you’re down in Wall 
Street, do you know any stock that’s sure to go 
up?” 

I stood aghast. 

“What idiotic thing are you thinking of now?” 
I gasped. 

“Well,” he mused, “here’s this twelve dollars. 
1 don’t know what to do with it. Just thought 
there’s nothing any more likely to take wings and 
fly uj) wards than a good stock, unless it’s this 
twelve dollars. Take it and invest it for me. Ten 
shares, one point margin. Two points gives me 
thirty dollars in all. Buy thirty shares same way, 
two points gives me ninety dollars. Soon be trad- 
ing in hundred share lots. Won’t take any time 
at all to have ten thousand dollars, then I’ll be 
rated in the news papers as an eligible. ’ ’ 

A thought struck me. 

“All right,” I said, “Give me your money.” 

He turned it over like a little lamb. I put it 
with my five-dollar bill, where it would get a good 
rest. Then I remembered that Billy was broke. 

‘ ‘Billy, ’ ’ I said, ‘ ‘ Come with me and have a good 
square meal, and then you’ll be able to get down 
to work and turn out something bully.” 

“Joe!” he shouted, “have you forgotten that 
this is the night of Mrs. Dunmore’s dinner 
dance ? ’ ’ 

I had indeed forgotten. 

“Give me that twelve dollars, Joe,” he said, 
“I put my dress-suit up for five dollars the other 
day, and I have to get some other little trifles. 


20 


It^s good I have my watch out. That’s always 
good to stand a cabman off if you get caught and 
have to take somebody home.” 

I turned over the money with some relief, in- 
wardly remarking that Billy could not be sore 
now if all stocks went soaring upward, while his 
own twelve dollars lay safely reposing in my 
safety deposit pocket. We went out together, I 
home to dress, and Billy towards that glorious 
institution which makes the rich man richer, and 
the poor man poorer still. 


II. 

Billy had execrable table maners. Not that he 
didn^t know which forks to use, or that he ever 
put his knife into the reserve supply of butter, but 
he had an idea that as he had no pecuniary dona- 
tion to give to Society, he had to entertain, as his 
part of the program. For this anomalous idea, I 
always bore him a righteous grudge. For instance, 
he would show the assembled guests how easy it 
was to tell a poker player, by handling the salt 
cellar like a stack of chips, and invariably dupli- 
cate it immediately afterward with the pepper 
box. If there was an egg handy, he was sure to 
have all present trying to break it by pressing the 
ends between the hands. I shall never forget my 
rage when he had a dainty little debutante try this 
with a cracked egg. 

He had a goodly audience at Mrs. Dunmore’s 
that night, and as he was seated some distance 
from me at dinner, he suffered no interruption. 
He certainly paid the price of his dinner from his 
own standpoint, for whenever I glanced in his di- 
rection, he was doing all the talking. And an un- 
broken coterie of attentive listeners was an added 
testimonial. Next to knowing how to monopolize 
one girl, Billy knew how to hold the attention of a 
crowd. 

“You see,’^ he was saying, “I missed my right- 
ful calling by a small accident. 

“And what was your rightful calling he was 
asked. 

“Why, the only one I ever had a thorough 
preparation for. All the world likes to read the 
experiences and reflections of a man who has 
done something.’^ 


22 


“And what have you doner’ somebody 
snickened. 

“Well,” he said apoilogetically, “I hadn’t got- 
ten to that part yet. I spent the early years of 
my life reading tales of adventure, of foreign 
lands, stories of the sea and wonderful islands. 
I knew I’d go there some day, too, and I dreamed 
of golden sands and sunny fountains, and longed 
for the jungle and the jewelled islands of the sea. 
I could quote Mayne Reid and Captain King by 
the page, and was sure that some day I should 
tread every step of their devious wanderings. 
Even the story of Sindbad the Sailor held out a 
golden promise. And even after I grew up, the 
desire still haunted me to get on the sea and sail 
to foreign lands. I never had a doubt that I 
could write a thousand books about my own 
strange adventures, and be the patron saint of 
every schoolboy. 

“I had a friend who came of wealthy parents 
and a gpod home, and I am sorry to say that I 
inoculated him with my own ethereal romances. 
He had involved his good father, and at last, had 
left home without the parental blessing. We both 
were stranded, and how to get to Europe or 
Africa or Asia was the thought uppermost in our 
minds. 

“So finally Rupert decided to make one more 
attack on the Home Office. He knew an appeal 
would be of no avail, so he had me wire to his 
father, ‘Rupert died this morning. Send five 
hundred to pay expenses and ship body.’ After 
waiting an execrable length of time, we received 
a reply which read, ‘Ship corpse C. 0. D.’ So 
we had to bid each other good-bye, and I went 
otf to College, instead of to be an international 
tramp. ’ ’ 


23 


Now Billy was a man above reproach. Every 
base insinuation from the merest gossip to a 
criminal charge, he had brushed aside with as 
little trouble, and with as perfect composure, as 
a Jersey cow picks an industrious fly from her 
side with the cracker of her tail. He was con- 
scious of having always been able to assail evil 
in whatever form it raised its head without hav- 
ing it thrown back in his face that he also was 
an aggressor. So he could do what other men 
could not. And he took especial delight in saying 
what other men could not. He could tell you he 
was a rogue, just as Hans Christian Andersen 
could tell you he was a fir-tree in the forest. No- 
body believed any of the awful things he told 
about himself, but laughed them otf as amusing 
stories. 

A waiter on his round offered his wares, but 
Billy waved him on his way. 

‘H)h, Mr. Carrolton,” said Mrs. Grant, ‘Hhe 
duck is delicious. Do take some.” 

am no friend of ducks,” announced Billy, 
once had the delightful task of carving a duck 
for five people. I did it so neatly, that when I 
had served the fourth, the duck was all gone and 
I was without. I had to explain, to justify my 
position without seeming to be ridiculous, by as- 
suring them that I never ate duck. And as by 
some people’s philosophy a statement may be 
equally true as to past or future, I had no choice 
but to make it future, if I wished to save my 
reputation for veracity. So I swore eternal enmity 
to ducks.” 

^‘How long have you lived in New York!” 
some one asked. 

knew a little boy once,” he evasively re- 
plied, ^'who had dreams. He was brought up in 
that scene of the busy world where everybody 


24 


dreams, and where dreams are brightest. Little 
bare feet and a swimming hole, a fishing rod and 
a shady nook beside a silver stream made life a 
miniature paradise. That was before Pandora’s 
Box was opened, and all good children were 
fairies. It was far away from the strife of of- 
fices and market places, and only the birds and 
butterflies came among the fields of waving grain. 
The boy was happy. In every rainbow he found 
the pot of gold that most children cry for, but 
never know until it is theirs no longer. 

^^The boy had never seen the world. He be- 
lieved that all it held was simple minded folk that 
loved their home, their country and their Grod. 
He thought that everybody went to church on 
Sunday, because he was always there and saw 
everybody that he knew. He was sure that every- 
body said their prayers, and then did their simple 
best to live the life they prayed to be helped to 
lead. He found it easy to forgive, because he 
knew not any man who had wilfully wronged an- 
other. His dream was of a man who was noble, 
good and true. Of a face that was wondrous 
kind, a heart that had time for everybody’s 
sorro«w and a help for everybody’s need. He 
dreamed of pleasure, too, but of pleasure that he 
could give to little children his mother told him 
of, who had no brook nor chestnut tree, perhaps 
no mother — no home perhaps. Children that 
lived in crowded houses, without even the sun 
that so abundantly was his, that followed him 
like a pla5unate everywhere he went. He never 
dreamed of greatness, or of fame. To him the 
greatest man was one like his father, who brought 
a smile wherever he came; whose fair page of 
life had not one single mar upon its snowy white- 
ness. Or like his mother, to him more saint than 
woman, whose lightest wish was law to all her 


25 


laved ones, who thronged aronnd her and vied 
with each other to do her all the homage be- 
stowed upon a Queen. Who never slept, who 
never rested, but always upon some mission of 
kindness or of mercy, bent willing footsteps that 
never tired. 

^^The boy grew up in a home whose threshold 
was never crossed by strife or shame. The in- 
fluence of the home had served its time, and then 
came the crucible and the mould. Four years of 
College Life work many changes, and many half- 
formed characters are burnt to slag in the fierce 
blast of temptation. The boy had gone from 
home to improve the mind in which simple life 
and the air of a pure and happy home had created 
a thirst for knowledge. There was no money to 
pay his way, for there were still at home many 
mouths to feed; and besides, the boy had been 
bred to climb his own hills and fight his own 
battles. He paid his way, which wasn’t much, 
and finally received that grand diploma which re- 
cites in a language, dead but not forgotten, that 
he had risen from the Plebeian mass to the seats 
of the Mighty, and that his proper sphere in life 
henceforth was to mingle with the great and 
learned of all times and to enjoy the fellowship 
of educated men. And with this flowery eulogy, 
he was forthwith foisted upon a cold world of 
facts and figures.” 

“And what were his ideals worth there?” 

“In their coinage, nothing; in his own, enough 
to make failure worth while. He naturally gravi- 
tated to the Nation’s great whirlpool. He viewed 
the Bears and the Bulls as a healthy athlete views 
two opposing teams, each in perfect trim for bat- 
tle. And after a bitter contest and a signal 
triumph, he was told that the Bears were beaten. 
But next day the same Bears were driving hard 


26 


against the same old line. Then the Bulls went 
down in ignominious defeat. But their bellows 
ceased scarce long enough to let them drag their 
horns free from the briars, and they were up and 
at it again. And then he saw another party in 
the game, a party that once cut down, was out of 
the running, and another innocent was led to the 
slaughter. The boy said, ^ Is this life ? Surely not 
the life I was brought up in, where people strove 
to help one another, and no man was really happy 
unless he had contributed something to another’s 
happiness.’ So he left the market place, and 
sought another sphere.” 

“Did his ideals suffer by the experience!” 

“Not a whit. He gloried in the consciousness 
that when he left the ring, he carried with him 
none of its sordid treasure. Clean hands were 
his sole capital. For five years they have con- 
tinued to be, and dividends are paid regularly in 
the shape of a light heart and a clear conscience.” 

The guests arose from the table and drifted 
slowly toward the ball-room. Billy unconsciously 
found himself taking a fatherly interest in a 
young and tender shoot who had in due course 
received the invitation addressed to Miss Eliza- 
beth Manners. It took half the first dance for 
Billy to recall the name she had been introduced 
to him by, and then he led her out on the balcony 
among the flowers for a breath of fresh air. 

“Mr. Garrolton,” she ventured timidly, “was 
that yourself you told that story about!” 

“Not exactly,” he replied, in a reverie, “it 
was the story of the little boy in the dream.” 

“But didn’t the dream come true!” she asked. 

“I often wonder,” he mused. “I really believe 
it’s going to, for my faith in my future has ever 
been unclouded. Yes, I believe I will attain it.” 

“Have you ever been in love!” she asked. 


27 


Now Billy had been asked this same question 
times without number, and by actual count, he 
had one hundred different stock answers ready. 
But this time the question called for an entirely 
new sort of reply. 

‘‘Why do you ask?” he said. 

She looked up at his handsome form that many 
a woman must have admired. To the frank, 
noble face and the big brown eyes that must have 
set more than one heart all on fire. And as she 
looked, she wondered at her boldness. Still she 
ventured on. 

“Because you made no mention of it — if you 
had — in the story of the little boy or of his 
dream, and I wondered if you had not known 
how much it would mean to you in realizing that 
dream to have a woman that you loved and wor- 
shipped, and that would help you to reach your 
goal. And then ” 

“And what then?” 

‘ ‘ And what it would mean to any woman in the 
world to have the love of a man with such ideals, 
who was so true to the purity and memory of 
those days when every thought was pure and 
unselfish. She would be the proudest woman in 
the world to know that she had a husband whom 
the world could not conform to its compromises 
and its snares.” 

“Miss Manners,” he said quietly, “no woman 
wants a man who is a failure. By the world’s 
standard, that is my status. And though I con- 
sider it worth while, I am sure no woman could. 
I am a strong believer in the custom of chivalr>^ 
that no man has a right to marry any woman un- 
til he has won his spurs. Would you want to 
marry a man, Miss Manners, who had done 
nothing worth while, who had no assured income. 


28 


and who might find himself forced to sacrifice, 
his principles to save himself from having to sacri- 
fice you?^^ 

Miss Manners suddenly found herself in need 
of rubber boots. She had never had a proposal, 
and in her foolish little head, this sounded re- 
markably like one. She never for a moment 
thought that in Billyhs reverie, she was merely 
a phonograph. To say ‘‘yes,^’ would be an un- 
warrantably bold presumption. To say ‘‘no,^^ 
would be an ignoble desertion of her contention, 
and in flat contradiction to the palpitation of her 
organ of affection. A high state of fear drove her 
to a frank confession. 

‘‘I would marry no man, Mr. Carrolton, who 
would sacrifice his principles for my comfort or 
my life. Such a sacrifice would drag me down to 
the same level, and living would then cease to be 
worth while. 

‘‘I grant you that,” he assented, ^‘but I could 
allow no woman to be placed by me in a position 
where a choice of those sacrifices was inevitable. ’ ’ 

She saw she was safe. 

^‘Nevertheless,” she argued, “I still maintain 
that success to you will be a will-o’-the-wisp, until 
you have found the love of a good true woman, 
and have loved her with all the ardor that you 
love your ideals.” 

A face appeared among the flowers. 

“Ah, Mr. Spider and Miss Fly. Come, Billy, 
the Entertainment Committee is shirking.” 

It was Mrs. Dunmore. 

“The Entertainment Committee,” he said gra- 
ciously, handing Miss Manners to her through the 
flowers, “has been doing valiant service. I give 
her my very heartiest recommendations. I have 
not been so royally entertained in years.” 


29 


Don’t mind him, Dear,” said Mrs. Dunmore, 
”he’s always saying foolish things. But come, 
you mustn’t lose these dances.” 

Billy spent the remainder of the evening in a 
state of disquietude. He danced once with a girl 
who always bored him. With another who 
wanted to tell him gossip and scandals. With 
another who was an intimate friend of Malcolm 
Perkins, and he was afraid of contamination. So 
after faithfully doing his duty as a martyr, he 
found his way to the smoking room in anything 
but a pleasant mood. 

”Fine allegory you told us at the dinner table, 
Carrolton,” met him as he entered the door. 
”Who was the hero?” 

”You must have been reading the Youth’s 
Companion,” from another. 

‘^You forgot to tell us about your first chew of 
tobacco. ’ ’ 

In truth, he was beginning to think his story 
had been frightfully incomplete. 

‘ ‘ I came up here to rest and listen, not to talk, ’ ’ 
he said, falling into an easy chair and lighting a 
cigar. ”It’s somebody else’s turn to talk now.” 

He listened to a rambling discourse on every 
subject on earth, and all the while, one question 
was running through his brain. What requisite 
to success did he lack? Principle, that was the 
one asset he had. He had never sold, mortgaged 
or pawned it. Energy, he had spent sixteen 
waking and eight sleeping hours a day at that. 
Billy was not a loafer. Luck, there was no such 
thing as luck. He did not believe in its existence. 
But somewhere, buried from sight in the strata 
that go to make up life, something was missing. 
He was seeking it with an ever-wakeful persist- 
ence. But he looked in vain for any sign of it 


30 


in tlie chatter of the smoking room. Perhaps the 
girl was right. 

Billy was not among the last to bid Mrs. Dnn- 
more good-night, thanking her for a most charm- 
ing evening. Mrs. Dnnmore thought she noticed 
an unwonted look on his face, and jumped at a 
conclusion, for which she was famous; but failed 
to hit the mark, for which she was not famous. 

‘ ‘ Sorry I interrupted, Billy, ’ ’ she confided. 
^ ^ But I didn ’t tumble in time. ^ ’ 

But he only put her further in the dark by say- 
ing, to her great confusion, 

‘‘You came in the nick of time. You always 
do come at just the right moment. 

Alone upon the avenue, he strolled aimlessly 
down town. I caught up with him after a few 
blocks, and linked my arm in his. 

“Billy!’’ I exclaimed, “if it’s true, I want to 
congratulate you.’” 

“On what, dunce?” he asked. 

“Oh, Mrs. Dunmore told me confidentially what 
she unintentionally overheard.” 

“Eavesdroppers never hear any good of them- 
selves, ’ ’ he replied. ‘ ‘ So much for Mrs. D. But 
I did meet a clever little girl, Joe, that gave me 
some good new material for a story.” 

“Did she accompany it with local color?” 

“That’s very ambiguous,” he hazarded. “I 
don’t know exactly what you mean.” 

“I didn’t refer to paint,” I said. “You know 
the proper way to remove paint is to kiss a chorus 
girl, but I didn’t for a moment mean to accuse 
your nova inamorata of painting her face. But 
surely you must have inspired some real color in 
it.” 

“Bosh, Joe,” he indignantly replied, “she’s 
only a little foolish girl, but I happened to get 


31 


some good thoughts out of my chat with her. 
That’s all.” 

The next night, I saw Billy again. I have some- 
what hinted at the fact that being a Society 
Favorite was an invaluable meal ticket to him. 
No man is going to starve to death on four or 
five good square meals a week, and Billy’s record 
never fell below that. To-night it was the dinner 
of a State Society, one of those heterogeneous 
organizations which meet every once in so often 
to do homage to the glorious State that they have 
outgrown, but which they still think is the only 
State in the Union where a decent man has any 
right to go to be born. Mr. Smith was there, in 
right of his father, who, with the cradle contain- 
ing Mr. Smith under one arm, and his next- 
door neighbor’s family plate under the other, 
climbed with some difficulty — ^but with much 
alacrity — over the intervening back fences in the 
dead of night, and ran the gauntlet to a more 
healthy climate. Mr. Jones was there, who, 
having made yearly migrations to New York to 
sell what he spent the remaining eleven months 
of the year collecting in Kentucky, did on one 
occasion lack the necessary fare to return. And 
as he had never since been able to raise it, he 
was present that night with his Brother Bourbons 
to do homage to his glorious State, whose fields 
were the greenest, whose women the fairest, and 
so forth. The Reverend Mr. Brown was there, 
who, if his speech were to be believed literally, 
had left the domains of Christendom to carry the 
light among the heathen. Do not for a moment 
think that I cast any reflection on Kentucky. Far 
be it from my thoughts. I freely grant you that 
with one exception, Kentucky is the fairest star 
in the galaxy of our National Constellation. 


32 


The first item of importance, passing over an 
enthusiastic hand-shaking and myriads of ‘‘Howdy, 
Colonel,’^ was a cocktail. Not a common cocktail, 
hut one that had to stand the test of connoisseurs, 
the Board, so to speak, of National Examiners. 
It was accepted and ordered spread of record. 
Then a dinner that must of necessity have eman- 
ated from some dear old nigger Mammy, way 
back in the kitchen with her snowy cap and apron. 
How it was praised and relished ! And with what 
added zeal and fervor were those courses inter- 
spersed with the “Suwanee River’’ and “My Old 
Kentucky Home.” Then more goods things to eat, 
and after cotfee, the toastmaster arose and rapped 
for order, which was responded to in various ways 
and in varying degrees of demonstration. 

“Brothers from Kentucky,” he said in tones of 
patriotic reverence, “We have met here to-nigM 
to honor the State that gave us birth, and to re- 
new the friendships that are made eternal by the 
common love of the Country where the Blue Grass 
waves. (Rah! Rah! Rah! One bottle of whiskey 
knocked over in the excitement. Promptly replen- 
ished.) There is no man among us who re- 
members his life in Kentucky who does not know 
the highest, noblest meaning of Home. Where 
others strive for sordid gain, or wander over the 
earth in search of what they cannot find, we have 
a home to look back into, nestled among fertile 
hills and beside quiet streams, whose every spot 
resounded with the merry cries of happy children 
and loving parents. Men lived there who lived 
for comfort, for happiness, whose only thought of 
gain was to lay something by for after years. 
Those years have told in the history of our great 
Republic. Kentucky has furnished those institu- 
tions that have been the fundamental stones in 
our National Edifice, that have made revered and 


33 


sacred the Home, for which we have fought, and 
for which every man of us is ready to fight again, 
and if need be, to die. (Three cheers, sounding 
like thirty-three. Much liquor lost. Supply, how- 
ever, undiminished.) It is not my purpose here 
to take your time or ito occupy your attention this 
evening. Many noble sons whom Kentucky 
delights to honor are with us to add their testi- 
monial to her undying greatness, and to the un- 
dying love of all her sons to their Great Kentucky 
Home. So I yield to them their privilege.^’ 

Many rose. As many as could. All yelled like 
a band of Comanche Indians in a night attack. 
A toast was proposed to Monsieur le President, 
and the clinking of glasses sounded like the fall of 
a tin-can factory until it was drowned in the 
strains of ^ ‘ Dixie. Billy entered into it all with an 
enthusiasm quite Kentuckian, adapting himself 
always to the present occasion. 

Then came a turn, unhappily reserved a bit too 
long. It was the musical piece de resistance. 
Every man had before him the words to ‘‘Aly Old 
Kentucky Home,^’ and the orchestra did its best 
to coax the brethren into unity. But alas! they 
sang in too many different keys, and many of 
them held their paper upside down, though I am 
not sure that it mattered in the majority of cases. 
Most of the braves sat down after the effort in 
rather a sheepish manner, and the vocal produc- 
tion could hardly be voted a success. 

Some dozen speakers testified in rapid fire 
order, each corroborating the others as to the 
main facts, and making the pretty compliments as 
confusingly innumerable as a field of daisies. 
They all referred in terms of love and adoration 
to the grizzled veteran who had carried his sword 
in three wars, who was reserved for the grand 
effusion. And who had emptied his glass a cer- 


34 


tain number of times half way between oblivion 
and infinity, in response to the repeated oiferings 
of everybody present. 

And then the toastmaster arose and mutely 
asked for what he did not get. He talked against 
great opposition, both from within and from with- 
out, of how Kentucky had furnished the leaders in 
the Forum and in the Field; of how the ancient, 
mediaeval and modern history of our Common- 
wealth teemed with the deeds of her heroes and 
the laurels of her Statesmen. It was perhaps an 
echo of the multifarious toasts he had drunk that 
prompted him to say that it was Kentucky that 
had brought forth the Boone to our Pioneer civil- 
ization, and that she had not been represented in 
the National Forum by common Clay. And then 
he turned to the grizzled veteran who was the liv- 
ing picture of innocuous desuetude, and heaped his 
honors thick upon him. Whereupon the toast- 
master subsided into that silent retreat from 
which he had defended himself only by the last 
heroic burst of nerve. 

The living picture seemed awakened by the 
silence. He knew instinctively that he was ex- 
pected. And grasping the crockery unsteadily, he 
rose to his feet amid the thunderous cheers of 
his fellow statesmen. Much glassware was here 
doomed to appear no more, for the General had a 
warm spot in every heart, and adulation surged 
on and on like the swiftly rolling waves 
of an angry sea. He found his voice at last, but 
did not recognize it. It seemed far away, but after 
a few successive trials, he ventured out. 

“Brussers/’ he said fearfully, holding tightly 
to a neighboring orange, ‘‘Ken — tucky ish great — 
(hie) State. I — f — f — fought fer K — (hie) Ken- 
tucky lotsh timesh. B— b — besht shtate in — whole 
work Shree (hie) sheers fer K — k— Kentucky.^’ 


35 


Lustily they were given, and long prolonged, 
but by the time they had subsided, the General had 
also subsided — under the table — and was no- 
where to be seen. He was soon part way to the 
tiring line again, however, fighting every inch of 
the way, when Billy, sitting next to him, was 
seized with a consuming desire to* save the day. He 
gently laid his hand on the General’s shoulder, 
thereby causing the old soldier to lay down his 
arms once and for all. Then he rose to his feet. 

“Men of Kentucky,” he said in clear and ring- 
ing tones, “No voice has spoken here to-night save 
of those who saw the light of day upon Kentucky’s 
soil. It was not my lot to be bom among you, hut 
I have seen and lived every inch of those fields of 
blue-grass, those hills that stretch away into 
happiness and plenty. But though I was not born 
there, my father was, and reared to manhood 
among the men with muscles of iron and nerves of 
steel, men who from the infancy of America have 
forged into her institutions the principles of jus- 
tice and clean hands. Of her history, little has 
been said here to-night. Of her importance to the 
Oommonwealth of America, volumes could be writ- 
ten. In her life and in her warring growth, she 
has been peculiarly and distinctively American. 
Her songsters and her Statesmen, her warriors 
and her writers, have been no lukewarm advent- 
urers to be sung by one generation and forgotten 
by another. The old Suwanee River, still flowing 
through Kentucky though its name be changed, 
shall flow on through every soul of us from child- 
hold to old age, as long as America shall live to 
know the sound of music. The women of Ken- 
tucky, through wealth and poverty, through war 
and peace, shall live as the monument of nobility, 
of beauty and of patriotic loyalty. 


36 


“In the brief moment that I have to speak, I 
would remember one trait of old Kentucky, 
born in danger, bred in hardship, and triumphant 
in service. And that is the unselfishness of a race 
of Americans that labored, looking far into the 
future, seeing only the glory of their coming na- 
tion raised above all the governmental monu- 
ments of mankind. I see the mother with her 
babe, outside the rude block house, with few com- 
forts and no luxuries. I see her lord and master 
tilling in the field, riding to the chase, crouching 
behind each stone and tree for the defense of his 
loved ones. He had a better heritage had he re- 
mained where white men lived in peace and com- 
fort, but where would our national life have been 
to-day had he not braved the dangers of the 
wilderness! And I can see the dark and bloody 
ground all filled with waving grain, when toma- 
hawks were buried and the red man had gone to 
lands beyond the setting sun. When worthy sons 
of sturdy sires took up the great battles of peace 
and wove into the everlasting fibre of our Consti- 
tution the principles of constructive citizenship. 
I see them at the bar, making justice a reality. On 
the floor of Legislature, Congress, Senate, de- 
manding Justice to all and Liberty for all. And 
back of all, I see the influence of the Home, the 
fountain of all national life, its source forever 
pure, its chastity inviolate. And so. Brothers of 
Kentucky, I stand before you with pride that is 
rightly mine, the heritage of an honored State, 
whose name be ever bright and fair. Grood-night.’^ 
To a man they rose and crowded about Billy. His 
“Grood-night” had been most happy, in making it 
possible to dispense with any further spell -bind- 
ing and with any formal adjournment. That he 
had saved the day was very evident; that he ha.d 
acquitted himself nobly, was the universal decis- 


37 


ion. He was warmly congratulated, invited to 
have numerous drinks, but finally escaped, and we 
were soon walking up the Avenue, arm in arm. 

I had just been complimenting him, when he 
signified his displeasure. 

'‘What’s the use, Joe!” he cried. "It’s all 
damnably artificial. The glare of the lights, the 
good-fellowship and all make a fellow feel those 
things, but when he gets out in the dark and feels 
the tugging at his heart strings, it makes a fellow 
lose heart. I think I’ll just go back to Kentucky, 
find a nice little farm and a pretty little country 
girl that never heard of riches or fine laces, and 
settle down for a long pull. I told the truth when 
I said that those were the people to be praised. I 
might also have said truthfully that they were 
the people to be envied.” 

"Billy,” I replied, "Wait till to-morrow and 
you’ll be different again. Come into the Club and 
look into the fire a while and you may see some- 
thing. ’ ’ 

"No, Joe, there’s nothing in the fire for me. 
There’s a light that doesn’t shine out of fires, and * 
if it doesn’t shine for a man, he might as well lay 
down his arms.” 


III. 


If the winter days had been filled with interest 
and amusement, the bright Spring days that 
came in due course brought with them much that 
was fascinating and uplifting. There is so much 
of hopefulness and promise in the bright sun, the 
vanishing snows, the bracing air, that it inocu- 
lated even Billy, who was wont to follow the time- 
honored doctrine of lassez-faire, and believe that 
the seasons had to follow each other in rotation, 
anyway. On one of these particularly fine 
mornings he was strolling in the Park, when he 
felt a light tap on his shoulder. Turning about, 
he met the smiling gaze of a former friend who 
had decided it was better to work than to starve, 
and who accordingly had vanished from the 
ethereal world to take up his allotted place in the- 
material. 

“How much money have you, Billy?” he asked. 

“Hard question,” he replied. “I should have 
to refer you to my secretary for that.” Then smil- 
ing, he asked, “How much do you want?” Billy 
never offered explanations until the proper time. 

“I don’t want any, Billy,*’ he said, to Billy’s 
great relief, “But T. want to do something for 
you. Have you any -life insurance?” 

“No.” 

“Would you take some?” 

“No, I don’t see any benefit. Have to die to 
get it.” 

“Would you if it didn’t cost you anything?” 

“Now, that sounds well already. Proceed, 
Napoleon.” 

In short, Billy was offered a policy for any 
reasonable amount he might name, on which the 
first year’s premium would be nothing. After 


39 


that, if he chose, he could let it drop, or carry it 
along at his pleasure. Sitting on a bench by the 
way, they filled out the application blank, which 
called for a policy for fifty thousand golden dol- 
lars, a date was set for a physical examination, 
and Billy and the agent went on their respective 
ways rejoicing. 

He met me at a little Italian cafe where we 
had planned to lunch together that day, and laid 
the scheme before me in great glee. He saw no 
chance of immediate gain, it is true, but it had 
occurred to him that he was protecting his many 
creditors, who would be taken care of if he slipped 
the cable before the year was out. This seemed 
tangible enough to him to constitute a vested in- 
terest, and his own stock went soaring upwards. 
This was before the days when magnates and 
Captains of Industry were placed upon the rack 
and told to account for their tremendous business. 
Whether Billy’s free policy was a money maker 
as an advertisement, does not appear upon the 
books of the Company, but he was duly examined, 
accepted as an excellent risk, and received a 
policy, signed and sealed, for fifty thousand 
dollars. 

A few evenings later he was sitting before my 
fire reading his newly acquired policy, when he 
startled me by jumping to his feet. 

‘‘What’s up now, Billy?” I asked. 

“By Jove, Joe,” he exclaimed breathlessly, 
“This thing says it has a borrowing value!” 

I smiled. The same thing had once occurred to 
me. 

“That sounds like something for nothing, 
Billy,” I said. “How much does it say you can 
borrow the first year?” 

He looked long and hard. Finally he quietly 
sat down. 


40 


^^Can^t borrow anything before the third year/’ 
he announced. ^‘But surely there ought to be 
some way to work something out of it.” 

^^If anybody can do it, Billy,” I said ‘^It is 
you. ’ ’ 

He was in an office downtown the next da}^, 
when one of the inevitable, irrepressible agents 
for accident insurance came around looking for 
an applicant. The friend on whom Billy was call- 
ing, seeing an easy way out of a bad situation, 
sicked him on to Billy, upon whom he levelled his 
broadsides with as much ardor as if Billy had had 
ten thousand a week. Billy was looking for in- 
formation. The agent was delighted. 

Sixty dollars a year,” mused Billy. Worth 
it, sure.” 

^^And benefits in accident and sickness that no 
other company can offer,” added the agent. 

^^Now I’ll tell you what you do,” said Billy de- 
cisively; ^Wou give me your card, and in about 
sixty days. I’ll send for you and take out this 
policy. ’ ’ 

” No need of that, sir,” rejoined the agent, quick 
as a flash. ^Wou had better have the protection 
afforded by the policy meanwhile.” He drew a 
blank note from his pocket. ‘‘Just make out this 
note for sixty days, and the policy is delivered to 
you at once.” 

Billy hesitated. Not from choice, but from di- 
plomacy. 

“Suppose the note isn’t met!” he asked with a 
smile. 

“Policy is cancelled and you have had the full 
benefit of the insurance for two months.” 

This was too dead easy. None of his own jug- 
gling either. It was forced upon him much as the 
captain of a merchant ship might sail into the 
company of a pirate, make him residuary legatee 


41 


of his valuable cargo, and jump into the sea. He 
signed his name to the note with a flourish, winked 
good-naturedly at the ‘'value received,’’ and made 
a friend for sixty days — anyway. 

An hour later he narrowly avoided a collision 
with a big touring car which bore down upon him. 
Of the quick or the dead, he preferred to belong 
to the quick, and jumped accordingly. Not that 
Billy lacked nerve. He had a head that would 
have done credit to many a Captain of Industry, 
or a master of high finance. But being one of 
those ethereal beings who live by their wits, he re- 
ligiously avoided the “over-exercise” occasioned 
by unnecessary effort. This charming class of 
men itakes life very easy. They are never rich be- 
cause they never see beyond the present need. 
They are never “broke,” because their phenom- 
enal nerve is trained to stand by them in emer- 
gencies. And the world admires nothing more 
than nerve. It may stand aghast, it may rise in 
protest, but like the man who hears the gruff sum- 
mons to hand over his money on a lonely street on 
a dark night, it delivers the goods and does the 
big talk afterwards. Like the large and well-in- 
trenched garrison which surrendered in the night 
to the handful of starved besiegers who made a 
noise like a mountain of Avild-cats, it follows in- 
structions, then cries out in its shame, and ends 
up by admiring the daring and courage of its 
despoiler. 

He counted up what it cost him not to get hit, 
and with a sickening thought, lamented his agility. 
AVhat more pleasant “vacation” than a vacation 
in bed, with a bevy of pretty girls bringing you 
flowers and sweetmeats, reading books to you, 
holding your hand, and -the big fat insurance com- 
pany keeping the doctor bill, the rent bill and 
every other bill paid right up to the scratch? 


42 


After this, numerous autos bore down upon him, 
but they always slowed up and turned out to pass 
him with a good round volley of well-deserved 
abuse. 

Sauntering up the street in the warm sunshine, 
he came to the abrupt conclusion that all this re- 
cent good luck deserved celebration. He was a 
man of atfairs now, with his life insured for fifty 
thousand dollars, and for ten thousand dollars in 
case of death by accident. He had already begun 
to think of it as money in the bank. First he 
thought he would deposit the two policies for safe 
keeping at a bank where he was not known, on the 
chance of establishing a line of credit. Various 
other schemes occurred to him. At last, he found 
one that seemed something like plajusible, and he 
hied at once to see his landlord. Old Solomon. 

^ ^Solomon, ” he chirped cheerily, ‘‘Got a busi- 
ness proposition for you.^’ 

“Vine, Meester CarroltonF’ fawned Solomon 
rubbing his hands together, “How much rent you 
vant to pay?’^ 

“Rent!” growled Billy, “You old skinflint! I^m 
paid up to next month, isn’t that good for a while 
yet? I have a chance here for you to make a 
clean fifty thousand dollars. How much will you 
give me for it?” 

“It debends on the schances. ” 

It was the only scheme that had appeared to 
lend any present value to the life insurance policy. 

“My life is insured for fifty thousand dollars, 
Solomon,” — ^Solomon went into a trance — “And 
the premium is paid for the year — up to a year 
from to-day. The chances are at least one in a 
hundred that I will die within a year, and that 
makes your chances of getting fifty thousand dol- 
hirs worth five hundred. I will assign it to you 


43 


for the period of one year, and you will give me 
five hundred dollars.^’ 

‘ ‘Let me see, ’ ^ said Solomon, coming to, ‘ ‘ If you 
die within one year, I make feefty tousand dollars. 
If you are alive in one year, you have my fife 
hundred dollars, und I lose.^’ 

“Well, if I die, don’t I lose!” demanded Billy. 

“I cand’t see it,” said Solomon. 

“Well,” replied Billy, somewhat disappointed, 
“You always like a gamble, and I thought you 
would like the chance of making fifty thousand 
dollars. You’ll live to be a hundred.” 

“I tell you vat I do,” bargained Solomon, “I 
gif you feefty dollar. You cand’t die.” 

“Make it a hundred.” 

“Feefty dollar.” 

“All right,” assented Billy, and Solomon pro- 
ceeded to count it out close to his shirt front. 

“You vant to pay some rent with this?” he 
asked. 

Billy’s expression needed no interpretation. He 
signed the assignment for the period of one year, 
which both of them labored over for half an hour, 
after Solomon had carefully read every word of 
the policy and looked at the unpaid-for receipt. 
Then Billy walked out into the Spring-time with 
a jubilant heart and fifty dollars. It was hard to 
tell which was more pleased, he or Solomon. 
Solomon evidently expected to renew his bargain 
one year hence. Billy had at last discovered how 
to make something out of nothing. 

The question of a celebration was not a fancy 
now, for he could celebrate royally on fifty dollars. 
He ran over his list of social creditors, and found 
it surprisingly large. He could give a dinner, a 
dance, a coaching party, a yachting cruise and a 
house party, and still leave many social debts un- 
paid. Casting about for a suitable entertainment 


44 


for a modest sum, he climbed onto an open car 
which was wending its way towards where he 
lived. Everybody seemed to want to ride on an 
open car, and seats and standing room were both 
at a premium. He gave his seat to a lady, and 
contented himself with standing on the step, ab- 
sent-mindedly pondering on his coming festivity. 

‘‘Look out there!’’ shouted several men. 

He didn’t hear, or if he did he didn’t look out, 
for a large van wiped him from the step and sent 
him sprawling in the street. Nor was that all, 
for a messenger boy on a bicycle got his sprocket 
wheel mixed up in Billy’s coat, and to mud and 
dirt were added rips and tears. Finally an 
industrious Dago with a hand cart, peacefully 
singing “Orange-a-banan, orange-a-banan, ” ran 
over his head gear, and made a visit to the hat 
shop an act of necessity. 

“I’ll make somebody pay for this!” he an- 
nounced angrily, as dirty and torn, he clambered 
back onto the car. But the van was gone, so was 
the messenger boy, and the Dago was execution 
proof. Then he thought of the accident policy, 
but with all his power of reasoning, he couldn’t 
make himself believe that he was hurt a particle. 

He reached home and replaced his damaged 
apparel. Then he sat down to take up the thread 
of his interrupted meditation where he had 
abruptly left it off. His accident had cost him 
the greater part of his fifty dollars, but that 
should not interfere with his plans, when once he 
had made up his mind. 

The cheapest form of entertainment that sug- 
gested itself to him was a tea. He could work 
in all the girls, and if the boys wanted to drop in, 
they would be welcome. On account of the 
stringency of the money market, he would invite 
them by means of Burton Matthews’ telephone. 


45 


and this in itself would lend to the informality. 
A few fresh flowers and what the party would 
regale itself with, would be the only expenses. 

The afternoon came, bright, warm, cheerful- 
just like Billy. The girls arrived in excellent 
spirits, and Billy found himself again in his ele- 
ment, looking after their happiness. Among his 
guests were several pretty little maids he had 
never met before, friends of some of his guests 
who had asked if they might bring them. Billy, 
with the eternal feminine always in his mind, look- 
ing for the unfound ‘‘She,^’ threw wide the gates, 
and gave carte blanche. 

The first one he made up to was a dream from 
far-away France. She spoke excellent English, 
but Billy would have none of it. He found out 
her native city, told her the names of the streets, 
described the pretty corners of it that he had read 
about in books, and then felt a malicious satisfac- 
tion as he watched her nearly throw a fit in her 
ecstasy of glee. It was so good to find somebody 
who had seen the moonlight stream over her own 
dear home. And had he seen the cafe on the hill 
just outside? What, the Cafe Marie Louise? 
Why, that was where the Petite Joliette made her 
first appearance. The sunny little French girl 
clapped her hands again. Billy was called away 
to minister to somebody’s wants, and mentally 
marked his latest acquaintance with an ‘‘XY.” 
Which stood for “X cellent, but not Yet.” 

The next one was a broncho buster from Colo- 
rado. He flattered her by telling her that he 
could not believe that those dainty hands had 
ever held the bridle over a maddened mustang, 
or lashed a frightened herd into subjection. But 
she only laughed and said she would like to see 
the horse she could not ride. He found that she 
knew the poetry of the plains, as well as the hard- 


46 


ships of the trail. She was interesting, but not 
the girl. 

The third one took his breath, if she did not 
take his heart. She was gentle, refined, cultured, 
knew the songs of the poets and the voice of 
nature. With a ripple of laughter she told him 
she thought she had been born on a horse’s back, 
as in the sunny South, she had lived out of doors 
where roses grow on everybody’s cheeks. There 
was nothing of the reckless spirit of the Western 
girl, nothing of the independence that lends itself 
to the woman of the frontier where she so often 
has to be her own protector. But it was rather 
the free spirit of the child who has never known 
what it is to fear or to doubt, but who, just the 
same, craves human atfection, and first, last and 
all the time, wants to be loved. Billy talked long 
with her, or rather, he let her talk to him. She 
seemed to possess more nearly the requisites of 
the Lady of his Quest than any he had yet met. 
So he sat beside her, until startled by the sound 
of the clock, he set out to look for the viands. 

He experienced a spinal chill as he looked into 
the room where two hours before, everything had 
been in readiness for a convivial feast. Now the 
cupboard was bare, and mental calculations had 
to be mighty quick. If it was a joke, it would, 
of course, turn out all right. But the servant 
was gone too, and Billy knew neither his name or 
his prison record. He walked into the hallway 
with a sickening heart, to see if he could strike a 
scent. But he struck no scent. Have you ever 
been on a train when the conductor came around, 
reached for your ticket and found it missing— 
with all your money at home in the bank? Or 
have you ever invited the apple of your eye to a 
luscious dinner, ordered with a prodigal abandon, 
and then discovered you had lost your wallet and 


47 


had to borrow the money from her to pay the bill! 
Well, Billy was up against a game thirty times as 
hard as that. For he had to face thirty girls, 
each of whom could no doubt eat a house, and 
each of whom had no doubt been enjoying the 
fragrant aroma of the missing delicacies for two 
hours. 

When a General goes out to reconnoitre, takes 
a peep into his pet intrenchment and finds it 
snugly filled with the enemy, he does not tear his 
hair or put on sack-cloth and ashes. He sits 
down on the nearest stump, takes out his lighten- 
ing calculator, and proceeds to overthrow the 
laws of Nature, warfare, or whatever stands in 
his way. So Billy scratched his head, had a short 
session on the fire escape, and then walked in and 
took up his stand with his back to the fireplace 
to deliver the principal address of the evening. 
He would explain his misfortune, throw the 
blame upon the dishonest servant, beg his guests 
to pardon the unfortunate results, trusting to 
their largeness of heart, and depend on the sav- 
ing grace of humor to extricate himself from a 
pitiable situation. 

Without apparently attracting any attention, 
he swallowed a lump in his throat. Then he 
swallowed another. It was hard. Then he caught 
sight of the servant through the doorway, and ran 
and fell on his neck — ^with both hands. 

‘‘Monsieur! Monsieur!” gasped that worthy. 

“ What do you mean! Where have you been!” 
demanded Billy. 

“Ze lady — ze lady ask me to go to her maison 
wiz ze note,” he explained, gesticulating wildly. 

Billy looked at him impotently. He knew he 
had been sold. And he could not be so heartless 
and cruel as to ask the man to point out the cul- 
prit. He therefore stopped to beg the pardon 


48 


of the man whose death by choking lie had so 
nearly accomplished, and turning, entered the 
room with his guests. Everybody there appeared 
to be having a fine time, each with a plate of 
cream, with cakes and candies in abundance. One 
of them stepped up to offer him a plate, which 
he accepted without a comment, except a humble 
“Thank you.’’ One of the damsels was calmly 
making the coffee near the window seat, and he 
could find nothing to say. 

“I’d like to see somebody do that to me, Mr. 
Carrol ton,” said the Miss of the Frontier. 

“I’ll give you my power of attorney and let 
you act for me,” he replied smilingly. 

“I promise you it wouldn’t be polite,” she said. 

“If you feel as hurt as you look, Billy,” said 
Grladys Stevens, “I shall be almost sorry for my 
part in it.” 

“And what was your part?” he asked. 

“I sent Frangois up to my house on a wild- 
goose chase.” 

Billy mentally pictured Eighty-seventh Street. 

“You didn’t make him walk clear up there?” 

“Certainly. I figured that he would be gone 
just long enough, but he wasn’t, by only a few 
minutes. He has done lots of things for me. I 
can always depend on Frangois.” 

“That’s more than I can do, Frangois,” he 
said, nodding towards the meek-looking French- 
man, who thereupon started in upon a voluble 
explanation, but was cut short. 

Some of the boys dropped in, and after a 
pleasant fete, the party broke up and Billy found 
himself booked for a theatre party where, to his 
extreme surprise and pleasure, when he got 
there, he found himself seated next to the girl 
who had been born on horseback. He discovered 
himself taking a most active interest in her. 
When she stopped talking, it was as if the lights 


49 


had gone out. Still he didn’t feel exactly that 
this was the ^ ‘ She ’ ’ that he was in quest of. He 
could not tell why, but she appealed to him as 
one who could be a mighty good friend. 

He glanced at her hands. She wore no rings. 
He looked at her critically, judicially. Then he 
shook himself and looked for a moment at the 
stage. No man, he was sure, could look so at a 
girl if he loved her. There would be a ditferent 
sort of attraction, and yet he could not name any 
attribute that this girl lacked. Between the acts, 
they walked together in the foyer, and when they 
were seated again in the box and the lights went 
out, he tried to peer through the simplicity and 
the sweetness of her manner, which was its own 
reserve, to see what she held towards him. 

She had evidently informed herself well as to 
the details of Billy’s picturesque existence, for 
she talked to him as though she read his mind. 
But through it all there was a tenderness that 
showed that she was a total stranger to satire and 
ridicule. 

‘‘I am going to have a visit soon from my old 
chum from down South, Mr. Oarrolton, ” she told 
him, ‘‘And we are going to have a house party at 
my Aunt’s home on the Hudson. I’m sure you’ll 
come and spend the week with us, won’t you?” 

Billy accepted on the spot. 

“And I know my old friend will interest you 
very much. I really expect you to fall in love 
with her,” she added coquettishly. 

“I’m always willing,” he said, smiling. 

“But seriously,” she continued, “She is just 
the sort of girl I would expect you to be very 
fond of. She is brilliant, witty, rosy cheeked and 
strong, and I don’t believe there ever was a 
kinder heart in the world.” 

‘ ‘ May I ask her name ? ’ ’ 

“Dorothy Lee.” 


50 


he said, ‘‘I shall await Dorothy's 
coming with a great deal of pleasure. You must 
know that I form ideals that are hard to reach, 
and I shall paint my image of Dorothy very 
bright. ' ' 

challenge even you to overrate Dorothy in 
your ideal," she laughed. have a premoni- 
tion that she will capture you." 

Billy had the honor and the pleasure of seeing 
his entertainer to her abiding place, and as he 
bade her good-night, he felt that the day had been 
very full indeed of Miss Betsy Page. He dis- 
missed the carriage at her door, and started down 
to meet me at the Club to talk it all over. As he 
passed in the deep shadows of a darkened porte- 
cochere, two belated females sought to intercept 
him. Stepping aside to pass them by, he felt a 
hand on his arm, and one of them in a voice 
truly pitiful said, 

^‘Please, sir, could you help us just a little! 
We haven’t any home or any money, and we want 
to get a place to sleep." 

Billy stopped out of sheer sympathy. Then he 
shook off the feeling and said ironicallly, 

^‘Your hands cold! Want to put them in my 
pocket a minute to warm them!" 

“We’re not that kind of girls," rejoined one, 
“We’re respectable if we are poor." 

He already felt a hand stealthily moving about 
in one of his pockets, and suddenly remembering 
that there was not so much as a farthing in any 
of them, he meekly and innocently submitted to the 
ordeal, and chattered along, apparently blissfully 
ignorant. When the operation was completed, he 
started to move on with a cheery “Good-night," 
but he was dismissed with, 

‘‘ Oh, go on, you ’re a cheap skate anyhow. ’ ’ 

Pie chuckled merrily as he walked along. 


51 


‘‘Pockets picked and nothing in them! Ha, Ha! 
ThaHs about as good as getting arrested for steal- 
ing money and then have it turn up. I wish that 
pair might run afoul of Malcolm Perkins now ! ’ ’ 

He laughed at it again as he drew up his chair 
in front of the fire to tell me about it. Though the 
days were warm, the open fire still felt good at 
bed time. Billy pronounced the day a complete 
success from first to last. To be sure, his credit- 
ors had lost their only chance for the present year 
—and most likely forever — but they were all able- 
bodied men, and didn’t need such heavy protection. 

He told me about the coming beauty and the 
house party. 

“Up to your old tricks again, Billy ! ” I said with 
a laugh, and yet with an inward hope, for I felt 
that it was high time for him to settle down and 
make some nice girl happy, out of the myriad that 
had set him on a pedestal. 

“Will we go!” he asked. 

“I’m not asked, ’ ’ I replied. 

“Well, you shall be,” he rejoined, ‘H^or if I 
didn’t have my old Guardian there, it wouldn’t be 
any house party at all.” 

Together we built castles in the air, while one by 
one the lights went out around us. Billy was a 
^Master Mason on air castles, an artist of the finer 
fabric of life, of the stuff that dreams are made 
of. He was a man who could see the faces in the 
clouds, hear the music of the spheres, and yet his 
heart beat just as fast and his blood flowed just as 
warm as any man’s that ever lived and loved. 
Like the little girl in the wretched hovel, that 
Dickens tells about, he could read the future in 
the fire, could see the living embers spell out only 
happiness and success. But all things human must 
have an end, and they finally put us out. 

Billy was tired and so was I. 


52 


car for me/’ he said, and I tacitly joined 
him. Within it, was a motley crowd such as one 
generally sees in a New York street car after mid- 
night, a series of studies in expression. There 
was the ubiquitous woman with the baby that 
ought to have been tucked away in bed six hours 
before. A triplet of convivial gentlemen who, if 
they had wives, had lectures at home awaiting 
them. The peaceful looking old gentleman with 
the family provisions, who was taking a nap 
preparatory to running ten blocks beyond his 
street. All these and many more changed the 
atmosphere so much that we sat silent, not caring 
to speak. Finally the gentleman who was asleep 
awoke. So anyone else would have done who hap- 
pened to be in a like state. Whether a cyclone 
occurred, or a collision happened, we were not 
advised. But we were all thrown violently into a 
heap, the lights went out, and chaos reigned su- 
preme. It seemed that a switch had been left 
open, and a car which should have gone in another 
direction left its orbit long enough to do the dam- 
age. I clambered out as quickly as I could, and 
waited for Billy to appear. But Billy did not ap- 
pear. I waited anxiously, and when they carried 
out several prostrate forms, I saw that one was 
Billy. 

‘‘Billy!” I cried, “You’re not hurt badly?” 

“I think my neck’s broke,” he said calmlj^ 

Several ambulances were already on hand, and 
into one of these they bundled Billy, willy-nilly. 
He begged so hard to be taken home instead of to a 
hospital, that I.finally added my entreaties to his, 
and he was soon lying in his own bed, though far 
from comfortable. 

His own doctor came soon, and after what 
seemed to me a very brief examination, he bade 
him good-night merrily, and closing the door after 
him, came out to talk to me. 


53 


The flowers that scented the room were still 
there from Billy’s reception. Next day there were 
more flowers, but Billy did not put them there. 
Kind hands and kind hearts were there in pro- 
fusion, and if nurses could cure, Billy was assured 
of a speedy recovery. But his old story of getting 
sick so somebody would come and sit by him and 
hold his hand, did not work out. I am sure no 
girl likes to exercise that tender care over a man 
who is in his dreamy delirium saying sweet things 
about some other girl. And Billy, from the train 
of thoughts of the day before he was put out of 
commission, mused upon the name of Dorothy Lee ; 
and as the fever held him he saw but one face, and 
that was his picture of her. 

Oh, sweet forgetfulness, in which we live a life- 
time in a moment, without a care, without a sor- 
row! Where every rose is tinged with gold, and 
every thing of beauty is upon a pedestal ! How 
fair the face of her who wears the crown of sweet- 
heart, who speaks from out oblivion the words the 
starving soul is thirsting for ! A barrier, firm and 
true, keeps out all that would mar, all that would 
burst the bubble and let in the world of facts and 
imperfections to wander among the flowers and 
pluck them ruthlessly from their fairy branches. 

Billy awoke more silently than he had been put 
to sleep. Several of the fairies of his dream were 
putting the finishing touches to the flowers, the 
curtains, the everything that was available, when 
he quietly announced '‘Good-morning.” They all 
turned at once, and in a chorus, seemed to ask, 

"How is Miss Dorothy Lee this morning?” 

The snowy whiteness of the pillows accentuated 
the blush on Billy’s cheeks. 

"I don’t know any such person,” he annoimced. 

A hearty laugh went up all around. 

"The idea, Billy!” said Miss Manners, 
seriously, "Would you go back on the only girl 


54 


you ever loved? The one you have been waiting 
all your life to meet and make your own?^^ And 
then they all laughed again. 

The drinks were on Billy. He didn T need to be 
told that he had been saying foolish things, so he 
laughed with the rest. It mattered little to the 
fair ones gathered around him that he had set his 
heart on another girl, for they were all sisters to 
Billy, and he openly declared his full appreciation 
of the obligations resting on him as the head of 
a large family. True, he did wonder who had been 
paying the bills lately, but modesty and diplomacy 
as well prevented any display of curiosity. 

Spring days are wonderfully suited to con- 
valescence. Motor trips along the winding river 
roads in the balmy air and the bright sunshine 
will make an old man young, to say nothing of 
making a sick man well. Old Solomon had lost 
his fifty thousand by a hair, for Billy was on the 
royal road to health. It was one day when we 
were seated at lunch at Claremont, looking out 
over the river, watching the little yachts flying up 
and down, that the- thought occurred to him. it 
was some thirty seconds later that he jumped up 
with a joyous exclamation. 

‘^What’s broke loose.now?’^ I asked him. 

^HVe beat that blamed Occident Insurance 
Company, so help me Jupiter!’’ he cried. Then 
on second thought, ^‘And I was riding in a street 
car and get double damages!” 

I surely thought the excitement would cause 
him to have a relapse, and if he had thought of 
the benefits to be derived fherefrom, perhaps it 
would. It was a wonder he did not announce a 
celebration. But from the quiet and absorbed way 
he took his seat and resumed his lunch, I was 
more than half inclined to believe that he was sav- 
ing up to make adequate preparations for the 
arrival of Miss Dorothy Lee. 


IV. 

It was a rare beautiful day in June, a day when 
all nature seemed to overflow with joy and glad- 
ness, that a merry party found itself in possession 
of the villa on the Hudson. Far away to the 
north, the river stretched among the hills like a 
silver thread. The chug-chug of the river 
steamers passing by came with a faint murmur 
from the water far below. The big house with its 
wide verandas and its ivy-covered trellises be- 
spoke a homelikeness that gave promise of many 
happy days to come. 

Billy Carrolton was waiting beside the drive- 
way with a nonchalant air. It was evident that 
some bit of social masonry lacked the necessary 
keystone to allow things to move with safety. 

‘‘Ten minutes more, Billy, shouted one of the 
boys, ‘ ‘ I think I can hear the machine now. ’ ^ 

“Shut up,” retorted Billy. “You’re a great 
bunch of asses. I’m trying to figure out what’s 
become of my baggage.” 

“I expect it got burnt up in the San Francisco 
earthquake,” suggested one. 

“I’ll lend you a pair of pajamas,” suggested 
another. 

Billy had blood in his eye when he was attracted 
by the arrival of more newcomers. His friend 
Miss Betsy Page was approaching with a dream 
in white. 

“Mr. Carrolton,” she said bewitchingly, “Here 
is the treat I promised you. ’ ’ Billy flushed. ‘ ‘Mr. 
Carrolton, this is my old friend. Miss Dorothy 
Lee. I know you’ll be awfully good friends.” And 
Betsy Page departed. 

For once in his life, Billy was at a loss. 
Here was a sudden appearance of a girl he had 


56 


been longing to see, and he didn’t know exactly 
whether so to inform her or not. On her part, she 
had been told tales of a modern Knight in armor, 
master of every situation, and she expected to 
hear him launch out at once. So it was inevitable 
that after what seemed a long and awkward wait 
on both sides, both started in at once, and both as 
hastily beat a retreat. Then a laugh which dis- 
solved the restraint, and Miss Lee ventured, with 
a smile, 

‘‘You are not living up to your record, Mr. Car- 
rolton. I was told I wouldn’t get much chance 
to do any of the talking.” 

“On the contrary,” he replied, “1 am a much 
maligned young man, and if I lived up to all my 
records, I would be a monster, I assure you. Shall 
we walk down the hill ? ” 

“An 5 rwhere you will take me,” she answered 
musically. “Betsy says you’re an excellent 
guide. ’ ’ 

Now Billy made a sad mistake. He was going 
far out of his ordinary course — the natural one — 
and was trying to dissect the divine Miss Lee on 
the basis of his expectations, and of the flattering 
reports he had received about her. He could not 
say that he was disappointed — far from it — but 
he was using his head instead of his heart. And 
when any man does this, the lady — whoever she 
be— must necessarily suffer in consequence. He 
had made up his mind to fall in love with Dorothy 
Lee — in fact he had already fallen in love with 
her; but it was with the Dorothy Lee of his 
dreams, and now he had to cut loose and tie his 
hawser to another craft. He was certainly revel- 
ling in delight as he led her back to the main army, 
and luncheon was announced, and just as certainly 
was he made well aware that he was the cynosure 
of all eyes. The Raison d^etre of the occasion 


57 


was to watch the progress of Billy and his affaire 
du cceur. 

I must confess that I felt peculiarly snubbed 
when Billy withdrew from me his confidence. 
Whether in joke or in earnest, I always looked 
upon myself as his best and truest friend, and I 
somehow felt hurt at his coolness towards me. He 
acted the rest of the day as if he were on the de- 
fensive with all mankind, and perhaps justifiably ; 
so it was not until bedtime that we found our- 
selves together and alone. Clad in my pajamas, 
and lighting a cigarette, I flung myself down upon 
a couch which I had pushed beside the open 
window. 

“Well, Billy, what have you learned to-day?” 
I asked. No answer. I craned my neck and saw 
him sitting beside a writing desk, his feet in the 
air. 

‘‘Is it a crime to read somebody else’s letter, 
Joe?” he asked. 

“Certainly,” I replied. 

“Even if there ^s no name signed to it any- 
where?” he pleaded. 

“It isn’t yours,” I argued. 

“No, but it isn’t anybody’s,” he answered. “It’s 
a clear case of abandonment, and can’t hurt any- 
one. Will you listen to it?” Reluctantly, I 
assented. 

“My own Treasure,” read Billy, “I wonder 
where you are to-night, and how you think of me, 
if ever your thoughts do happen to turn to the lit- 
tle boy who lost the whole world when he lost you. 
He is still here. Darling, true as steel to you yet, 
and always shall be. Love, can come but once, and 
while I have life, I shall love you always. Life 
has grown brighter lalely, as I have looked it all 


58 


over and started on a new course. Not that I do 
not think of you as much, but more. It took an 
awful effort and determination, but I mastered it ; 
and if God so wills, I shall come to you and take 
you some day for my own. He knows best, and 
we cannot question His ways. He will always 
keep you as good and pure as I have always known 
you, for I have asked Him. 

‘‘The bright Spring sun is shining again on the 
old hills and paths that we wandered through to- 
gether a year ago. The very breeze in the trees 
was music to me then, when my whole being was 
one prayer to you to be always and only mine. I 
heard no other voice but yours, though those 
there were that called me from your side. The 
whole world I threw away, content to be only with 
you and let you lead me on. Home, friends, all, I 
threw aside, and even now, as I wander down life’s 
pathway, alone in sorrow, I am content to be alone 
with those dear memories of you. 

“I still have the old dreams, sometimes, but 
your voice does not call to waken me. I find my- 
self again in the cold world of the forgotten, and 
your sweet voice, as I have heard it in my 
dreams, rings in my ears all the day with the 
bitter sweetness of rejected love. 

“I do not blame you. Dear, not once. I tried 
so hard to be worthy of you whom I placed be- 
fore all others, and if I was not, you did night. 
You must be the judge of him who is to lead you 
by the hand through life, and he must be strong, 
and good, and true. Love you more than I do, 
he cannot — not though he gave his soul for you. 
I would do as much. 

‘ ‘ Your old letters are my only comfort. I read 
them through and through, and they tell me that 
once you did love me. They are all I have left. 


59 


^‘Go'd will keep you, Darling, and some day, in 
Heaven if not on earth, you shall again see 

Your Sweetheart/’ 

^‘Lord, Joe!” he exclaimed after a moment’s 
silence, ‘‘What must it be worth to experience a 
love lake that? I don’t know who the poor devil 
is that lost his girl, but to have inspired a feel- 
ing like that, she must have been a marvel.” 

‘‘Not at all, Billy,” I corrected. “Simply that 
he loved the girl with all his soul. That is the 
sort of love that ennobles a man, even if he loses 
her. It isn’t the physical or mental attributes of 
\ a girl that touch a fellow’s heart, but some- 
thing entirely different. It’s an attraction to 
which only his heart can respond. But tell me, 
bow did you find Miss Lee?” 

“I didn’t find her,” he said disgustedly. “All 
I found was that everybody was having fun at 
my expense, and I half believe she was in on the 
game. I didn ’t really have time to study her. ’ ’ 

“Glad you didn’t,” I laughed. “That’s the 
wrong way.” 

“She is as pretty as a picture,” he vouchsafed, 
“Cultured, charming in every way. She is just 
the style of girl I like, but I know she thinks me 
a confounded idiot. I acted like a fool under all 
those jeers and I know she felt uncomfortable. 
But Joe,” he said, retuTning to the letter, “I’d 
almost be content to lose out too, if I could have 
a love like that.” 

“ Well,” said I, “Go to bed, and maybe you’ll 
find one to-morrow.” 

Poor Billy went to bed, but not to sleep. Ber 
tween his annoyance, and his effort to make the 
real and the pictured harmonize, he passed a rest- 
less night. When morning came, he looked a 
little haggard, but smiled as he prepared him- 


60 


self for the second round. He was trying a hard 
game. The charms of the renowned Miss Lee 
were surely telling. But in it all, the real Miss 
Lee was pitted against the Miss Lee of the past 
four weeks to Billy, and my only wicked sport 
was in watching to see how soon the phantom 
lady of dreams would strike her colors. 

At breakfast, Billy evidently resolved to beat 
his tormentors at their own game. He was as 
usual talkative, and unusually gay and light- 
hearted. Every pungent shaft directed at him he 
turned otf with an appropriate bon-mot, until 
even I began to lose heart, and fear that perhaps 
the game had succeeded in bringing about its 
own defeat. For if any weapon has an unbroken 
line of victories to its credit, it is ridicule. In 
politics, in government, in society or sport, it is 
used by Press and public to defeat the hunter of 
the object of his quest. And I truly believed that 
I was more interested in Billy’s victory here 
than was he himself. 

He had just denominated one of the gentlemen 
present as an ass. 

‘^No, no,” was the reply, ‘‘You can’t make an 
ass of me.” 

‘‘No?” queried Billy, “Perhaps you’re like the 
man who found himself in jail and sent for 
his lawyer, who listened patiently to the 
prisoner’s explanation of the case. ‘Why,’ ex- 
claimed the lawyer, ‘They can’t put you in jail 
for that!’ ‘But,’ expostulated the prisoner, 
‘They’ve already put me in jail. I’m here.’ 
‘Well,’ said the lawyer, ‘We’ll see that you get 
justice.’ But the man replied, ‘Don’t do it! 
That’s just what I’m afraid of.’ You’d better not 
appeal.” 

Billy hunted up Marion Lewis and took her off 
in a canoe. He would let somebody else play 


61 


cosy-corner for a few hours with Miss Lee — if 
they could. He was beginning to think house 
parties an awful bore. 

“I’m going back to New York to-night, 
Marion,” he said, as he drove the canoe fiercely 
through the waters of the little lake. 

“Oh, you silly boy!” she exclaimed, “Do you 
think I’d let these geese get the best of me? 
Don’t say a word!” she ordered with a wave of 
her hand, as he attempted to interrupt her, “You 
haven’t a particle of business in New York. You 
are simply running away from them.” • 

“Tell me,” he asked, “Isn’t is all a set-up 
game ? ’ ’ 

“Yes,” she answered decisively. “And would 
you throw down your racquet in a game of tennis 
simply because your opponent announced that 
he was going to make you fight if you wanted to 
win out?” 

Billy didn’t think he would. 

“How much does Miss Lee know of it?” he 
asked. 

“Absolutely nothing,” she replied. “Nor 
would anybody else if you hadn’t talked it your- 
self. There’s no malice in the game, Billy.” 

“All right,” he smiled, “I’ll play it out. But 
remember, I’m not committed. I never saw her 
till yesterday, and I never said I was in love with 
her except in my delirium, when a man has a 
perfect right to say anything, and which was also 
before I ever saw her.” 

“What do you think of her, Billy?” 

“That’s not fair,” he answered. 

“Why unfair, Billy?” she queried. “Have I 
indulged in any of the fun they have been poking 
at you? Have you ever had any truer friend 
than I? I’ll promise to stand by you if you’ll 


62 


promise to make me your confidant. I think the 
little girl is a jewel. 

^‘So do he acknowledged, whole cluster 
of them. But a man must have not only one 
whom he loves, but one who loves him in return. 
A jewel is too one sided. 

As Miss Lewis was landed at the float. Miss 
Betsy Page begged for a ride. The begging was 
unnecessary. ^‘Chapter two is coming,’’ he said 
to himself as she nestled herself among the 
cushions. 

‘M’m ready for a letter of recommendation, 
Mr. Carrolton,” she said smiling, as he wheeled 
the canoe about and sent it flying out into the 
lake. 

^‘To all whom it may concern,” he began, 
seriously, ‘^This is to certify that Miss Betsy 
Page is the sweetest girl I know ” 

“No, no,” she drawled, disgustedly, “You know 
I don’t mean anything like that. I want an un- 
biased report on the girl that I brought clear up 
here from Virginia, just for your especial bene- 
fit.” 

“I’m afraid my report would not be unbiased,” 
he said with a smile. 

“Well,” she responded, “That’s encouraging, 
at least. But I want a more detailed report.” 

“Want to give it to her?” he asked. 

“No, sir, I expect you to do that yourself. Or 
else you’re not the great artist I have been led to 
believe, and that I give you credit for.” 

“Miss Page,” he said at length, “Perhaps you 
can give me some good advice. I am very much 
in love with a girl, though I have almost given 
up hope of winning her. She is beautiful, she is 
kind, she has a heart too great for any wrong or 
any selfish thought. When I see the love that is 


63 


in her eyes when she looks at me, I would give 
all earth and heaven to call her mine. ^ ^ 

‘ ‘ And what does she say when you tell her that 
you love her?” 

^ ‘ That is a thing I may not say to her. ’ ’ 

“For shame!” she cried. “A man that can- 
not tell a woman that he loves her is not half 
worthy of her.” 

“You forget,” he corrected, “I never said I 
was half worthy of her, and I most willingly ad- 
mit that I am not.” 

“Your tale sounds more like poetry than 
prose, ’ ’ she said. ‘ ‘ I believe you must be talking 
of your ‘ideal woman.’ ” 

Billy laughed. 

“You have guessed right,” he confessed. “I’m 
still looking for her. ’ ’ 

“And you’ll never find her,” rejoined Miss 
Betsy Page. “When I went to school, they gave 
us a long bunch of X’s and Y’s and told us to 
find the answer. That’s what you have to do, 
for no ideal girl can ever love you in return, and 
that’s what you’re hungry for. How many of 
the X’s and Y’s have you found in my little 
friend. Miss Lee?” 

“Stacks of them,” he answered. “And if I 
had met Miss Lee in her native haunts, I have no 
doubt that I would have capitulated entirely.” 

“What do you mean?” she asked. 

“May I tell you in confidence?” 

‘ ‘ Certainly. ’ ’ 

“Only this. In endeavoring to gather the 
fragrance of this sweet little rose bud, I have had 
a myriad of thorns kept busy to disturb the pro- 
ceeding. You know,” he said laughingly, “I give 
every girl a fair chance.” 

“You conceited wretch!” she gasped. 


64 


At length, the Queen sat on her throne. Miss 
Dorothy Lee, with her wavy brown hair blowing 
about her bewitching face, lay comfortably 
among the cushions while the paddle lazily 
pushed the little boat along. If any one was 
innocent of plot or prank, he was sure it was she, 
as her big brown eyes looked frankly into his. 

never thought the North was half so nice as 
it is, Mr. Carrolton, ’ ^ she told him. ^^This is my 
first trip, and I feel that I’ve lost so much in not 
coming before. I thought Northern people 
weren ’t nice. ’ ’ 

Billy felt a queer sensation of freedom— of the 
wild abandon a tiger might feel after years of 
pent up misery, at finding again the liberty of his 
unruled kingdom. He sent the little craft along 
like an arrow in his ecstasy, and said laughingly, 
think you were right. I’d lots rather tell 
you how nice the Southerners are. ’ ’ 

She was truly innocent. 

‘ * Do you think so ? ” she asked. 

“Well, some of them,” he said, in mock re- 
flection. “If many more of them like you and 
Miss Bage come up here, I’m afraid we’ll have to 
fight the Civil War all over again on a different 
issue.” 

“That would be jolly fun,” she laughed. “It 
would be like the old days when every lady had 
somebody fighting about her. That used to be 
the way in the South, but the men have all grown 
too lazy and quit.” 

Billy took the count. He was captivated by 
the sweet, musical voice, with the fascinating 
accent that none may acquire, but many imitate. 
He held his peace and was rewarded. 

“And everybody up here does something 
clever. Oh, I’m going to see your drawings and 
read your stories. I’ve j;ieard about them.” 


65 


‘ ‘ My drawings are mostly on my imagination, ^ ^ 
he said, smiling. Then he suddenly thought of 
one inscribed, ^^Miss Dorothy Lee,” a fore- 
thought of what she was going to be like. As he 
compared the original before him with the absent 
portrait, he was forced to a confession that he 
had fallen far short. “I only draw for my own 
amusement. They are not worth showing.” 

‘M’ll be the judge of that. And what are your 
stories about?” 

‘^What would you expect the stories of a 
romantic youth to be about?” 

‘‘You hadn’t told me you were romantic,” she 
ventured, throwing Billy into confusion. “Of 
course, then, you have an ideal girl?” 

“I did have,” confessed Billy. 

“Did you kill her in the last chapter, or did she 
elope with the villain?” 

He gazed out over the lake without a word. A 
bass leaped from the crystal surface and glittered 
for a second in the sunshine, from the sheer joy of 
living. A brace of ducks swam by, afraid of 
nothing, and in their quack, he could distinctly 
hear the sound of laughter. Even the sunbeams 
dancing on the water showed forth their glee, and 
the wild happiness caught Billy with a thrill. 

“I don’t know,” he said slowly, looking into 
her eyes as if held there by magic, “She’s gone.” 

“I’m sorry,” chirped Miss Lee, “I’m afraid 
you’ll be lonely now.” 

“When we left the float. Miss Lee,” he said 
with his heart throbbing fast, “There were three 
of us in this boat. One has vanished, because I 
found she was a pretender. Her place is filled 
for me. I ’ve been waiting many years to find the 
one who would take her place, often with a sinking 
heart, till at last, I had given up all hope. But 
I have found her. ’ ’ And with a giant stroke ihat 


66 


sent the boat flying across space, he laid the pad- 
dle across his knees and leaned forward, waiting 
with a thrill for the response. 

What would have happened the day after the 
earthquake in San Francisco if the earthquake 
hadn’t happened the day before, will always be a 
matter of conjecture. And so will Miss Lee’s 
rejoinder, for a sunken rock created such con- 
sternation in the canoe, that Miss Lee did that 
which she had been particularly cautioned not to 
do — she struggled to her feet. Seeing the boat 
careen, Billy jammed the paddle down upon the 
gunwales, and pressed his knee upon it to steady 
the canoe. . But the sudden impact broke the pad- 
dle, and the crash which followed carried out that 
which the rock had begun, and Miss Lee had pro- 
moted, so that the canoe dumped its passengers 
into the lake. 

Billy came up first, and with a shock looked over 
the surface of the water. Then he saw two hands, 
and next a forlorn but not a frightened face. Duck 
skirts were not made to> swim in, but Miss Lee was 
keeping the water pretty well churned up. And 
as canoes have a way of taking French leave when 
they empty you out, there was nothing within 
reach to grasp. 

“Don’t clutch me,” called Billy as he struck out 
for her. 

“Don’t be afraid,” she said, between breaths, 
“If I didn’t have all these togs on, I’d beat you 
to that canoe.” 

She placed her hands on his shoulders, and 
quickly the canoe was reached. He righted it, but 
it baffled all efforts to put her into it. He could 
have vaulted in over the end himself, but what was 
the use, when he had no paddle! The lake might 
have been in darkest Africa, for all the people it 
contained besides these two, so Billy set to work 


67 


to push the boat to the nearest shore, half a mile 
away. Miss Lee did her best to help, and that in 
spite of Billy’s protestations. It was a hard task, 
but at last it was accomplished, and the boat was 
drawn up among the trees, and Dorothy Lee and 
her rescuer looked at each other in their dilapida- 
tion, and laughed. 

“How far from home are weT’ she asked. 

“I haven’t the least idea in the world,” he said 
with a shiver, “We must be five or six miles.” 

‘ ‘ And there is no way to get there but to walk?’ " 

“No, I don’t think Columbus has discovered 
this place yet.” 

Bravely she set out. 

“Then we musn’t wait. Bring those two cush- 
ions you saved. ’ ’ 

“What for?” 

“Why, we might have to sleep in the woods.” 

Billy had a sickening feeling. It was not warm, 
hidden there in the trees, as it had been in the 
bright sunshine on the lake when they both had 
dry clothes on, and besides, a chill breeze had 
sprung up that seemed to whistle among the pines. 
Miss Lee was drenched to the skin, and he could 
see her shivering, without the power to save her a 
single shiver. He did not mind it a particle for 
himself, for if he contracted rheumatism or pneu- 
monia, did he not have an accident policy? But 
all his sorrow, his anguish, his sympathy, was 
for her. 

“I’m sorry, little girl,” he said tenderly, “I 
will never forgive myself for my awkwardness 
and carelessness. ’ ’ 

“It was all my fault,” she said decidedly. “But 
canoes are new to me, and I should have kept my 
seat as I was told. That’s what I get for not 
trusting you.” 


68 


was not your fault at all/’ he corrected, 
had no right to let the boat get beyond my con- 
trol. Of course, it was an accident ” 

^^Was it?” she interrupted with a twinkle, 
thought that having just thrown your ideal over- 
board, you had decided to throw me too. ’ ’ 

Billy looked at her a moment, glancing up at 
him with a wicked smile in her big brown eyes, 
and then he broke a rule. He walked straight 
over and kissed her. Billy had a rule that no man 
should kiss a woman the first time he met her, and 
this was practically the first time. 

She sat down calmly on the trunk of a fallen 
tree. 

^‘Mr. Carrolton,” she said, ^‘if any man down 
South did that, he would leave me here and go on 
home alone. You may have as many rogues here 
as we have at home, but I don’t think you’re one. 
Do you always kiss a girl when you save her from 
a watery grave?” 

“Dorothy,” he said tenderly, kneeling beside 
her and taking her wet trembling hands in his, ‘ ^ 1 
have been seeking all my life for some one to love, 
and I have never met her until 1 met you. I would 
save any girl that I could for her own sake, but 
truthfully, I saved you for my own. Yes, I have 
had my ideal girl, and she has kept me true to my 
standards and my ideals until I met you. I have 
gone into the lists for her, and I have brought 
back her colors without a stain. It is you that I 
have been waiting for all these years, and I love 
you. ’ ’ 

She bent her face to his, and their lips met. 

Of all the joy, the rapture, the ecstasy of living, 
Billy experienced it all in a single second. He no 
longer envied the writer of the letter, nor had he 
any malice towards his tormentors. He could pity 


69 


them now, and patronize them in their child 
play. 

The supreme feature of Heaven is that it will 
go on forever. This could not, and the two foot- 
sore, aching wanderers finally, after a number of 
false starts, decided upon a dismissal, with leave 
to reopen the case. They could not tell how far 
they had walked, but the sun now was shining slant- 
ways through the trees, and that meant that night 
was coming on. But suddenly, with hope growing 
fainter every minute, they stumbled upon a road 
running across their path, and were startled by a 
^ ‘ ho’nk ! honk ! ’ ^ close by. 

Never had dinner bell in hungry time sounded 
so joyous. Instead of obeying the ‘‘honk/’ and 
side-stepping the approaching Juggernaut, Billy 
stopped squarely in front and threw up both 
hands. The driver stopped, and unearthed his face 
with a look of mystification and despair. It was 
one of the house party. 

“Carry passengers!” asked Billy, facetiously. 

“How many!” he asked. 

“Two!” ejaculated Billy, his teeth chattering. 
“How many do you see!” 

“Didn’t know but what there might be three. 
Ijooks as if he had been at work with his little bow 
and arrow.” 

“Why don’t you sell pools on it and get up a 
little excitement!” asked Billy good-naturedly, 
helping Miss Lee into the car. 

Dry clothes and a cheery dining-room soon took 
the place of shivers and chills. Miss Page, just 
entering, hearing something about an accident, 
hastened to inquire. 

“Why, didn’t you hear, dear!” informed one 
of the fair tormentors, “Billy and Miss Lee fell in 
all over.” 


V. 

Billy had an idea he could keep a secret. So had 
Miss Lee that she could. But Master Cupid has a 
great habit of sounding the alarm, calling out the 
Hospital Corps, and summoning first aid to the 
injured. Therefore, since History repeats itself, 
nobody was left long in the dark. I will be hanged 
if I can see what they had to be ashamed of, but 
Miss Lee blushed like a school-girl, and Billy acted 
like a farmer boy at a full dress function who 
doesn’t know where to put his hands or his feet. 
He endured the week out, however, with many a 
sick and weary look, and the party, having accom- 
plished what it was brought into being for, dissi- 
pated again into real life. 

Billy’s life settled at once into an apparently 
aimless routine of wanderings, with a certain spot 
on Seventy-second Street as a regular evening 
terminal. If he had been on probation — but un- 
doubtedly he was. It would have cost him dear 
to miss one of those daily appointments. I saw 
far less of him than I used to, and I involuntarily 
resented the intrusion of another into our hitherto 
continuous performance. If I dropped into his 
cosy den at evening, it was to wait until he came 
home at some unearthly hour, and roused me from 
my dreams on the couch. 

What’s matter, Joe?” he chirped. ‘‘I’d give 
a farm if I could sleep like that.” 

“Guilty conscience.” 

“Nothing of the kind.” 

“Than it’s because you’re in love.” 

“Well,” he admitted, “Do you blame me?” 

“Blame you?” I answered hotly, “Of course I 
blame you. You’ve found an angel of a girl and 


71 


apparently kidnapped her, and aren^t doing a 
blamed thing to set up shop except keeping her up 
late nights. The roses on her cheeks won’t last 
long with that kind of medicine. ’ ’ 

‘‘Gee whiz, Joe!” he growled, sitting down 
calmly with a look of injured innocence. “You’re 
as inconsistent as a dog’s hind leg! If I don’t 
make love to somebody, you say, ‘Why don’t you 
find a girl and get married!’ And if I get out 
and work harder at it than a three-legged dog in 
a foot race, you say, ‘Why don’t you quit spooning 
and go to work!’ Where do I get otf!” 

“You’ll be getting off at the poor-house before 
long,” I replied. “A man with your wits ought 
to have no trouble making a living, Billy, and if 
you expect to keep her as you should, you’ve got 
to make a blamed good one. And it’s my private 
inkling that you’ve got to begin to do it mighty 
soon. ’ ’ 

“Now look here, Joe,” he said, exasperated. 
“I took that job down in Wall Street, and you 
know I’d be rich to-day if I’d been willing to shift 
and juggle accounts the way they asked me to. 
I’ve never yet been sorry I let the ledger fly in 
old Williams’ face. Then I hit that real estate 
trail, and they still owe me for the commissions 
they stole from me. I’d never dare tell anybody 
about playing the piano down at Coney. It was 
a dandy job, but I’d lose caste.” 

“ Then am I to take it that you have given up 
the hope of making a living!” 

“Isn’t it hope to be writing the biggest part of 
every day and night, as I’ve been doing for 
months! Why, I’ve even written up every paper 
bag in the place.” 

“And your name’s never appeared, even in the 
directory. ’ ’ 

“That’s right, throw it up to me. I got you on 


72 


the Board of the Oceanic Electric Company, didn ’t 
I, by speaking to Morrow I ’ ’ 

‘‘My dear Billy,'’ I cried, “I’m not jumping on 
you. You know how quick I’d give you all I have 
and work hard to make you more.” I crossed the 
room and put my arm about his shoulder. “Tell 
me, old man, where’s the trouble? We ought to 
be able to fix it up together. ’ ’ 

“The particular trouble,” he said, “Is on the 
debit side of the ledger.” 

“You always maintained to me that the one 
thing lacking was the right girl. ’ ’ 

“So it was.” 

“Well, you’re sure of her now, aren’t you?” 

“ Sure as the Lord lets me live ! ” he cried, wann- 
ing up. 

“All right, now, just keep your coat on. The 
next conclusion is that there is still some small 
need. ’ ’ 

He made no comment. 

‘ ‘ She will want three meals a day three hundred 
and sixty-five days in the year, ’ ’ I ventured. 

Still no comment. 

‘ ‘ She will want a new dress once a month or so, 
a new hat every so often, her shoes wll wear out 
and she will have to have new ones — and oh, lots 
of things.” 

Audible silence. I really believe that he hadn’t 
thought of it. 

“There will be regular bills from the gas man, 
the ice man, the meat man, the milk man, the 
bread man, the laundry man ” 

“Joe,” he interrupted solemnly, turning so he 
could look me squarely in the face, “When I left 
home, my father said to me, ‘My son, there is a 
wise Providence that watches over fools and chil- 
dren. You will never be without a friend.’ ” 

“Which are you?” I asked, exasperated. 


73 


‘'I don't know," he laughed, "Take your 
choice. ' ' 

"Well, you're going to make some progress in 
this case before I leave here to-night," I an- 
nounced. 

For answer, he arose and went into the next 
room, and a moment later emerged with literally 
an arm load of manuscripts. 

"Oh, I've read all those a dozen times," I 
gasped. 

‘‘Well, aren't they good?" 

"Bully," I assented. "But you couldn't swap 
one of them for a pair of shoes if you tried all 
day. ' ' 

He reached over to a cabinet, and opening it, 
pulled out an equally large collection of musical 
manuscripts, and deposited them alongside. 

“That help any?" he asked childishly. 

“Not on this table, it won't." 

He seemed to have an inspiration. He opened 
a drawer in a desk, took the two insurance poli- 
cies therefrom, and proudly laid them with the 
assorment on the table. Then he drew himself up, 
and looked rich as well as handsome. 

"There, Joe," he said theatrically, "are my 
total assets. With all these, my worldly goods, I 
her endow. She must now take me for better or 
for worse." 

Further parley was useless. When you tried 
to comer Billy, when you tried to make him look 
on the serious side for his own good, he would in- 
variably turn to and string you the same way as 
he had learned to string himself. The best that I 
could do was to exact from him a promise that he 
would start out in the morning in earnest, and see 
every editor and every music publisher in town. 
Then I went home to catch the second installment 
of my much needed rest. 


74 


The next afternoon, he turned up at my office, 
just as I was leaving for up town. From the opti- 
mistic — yes, beatific — beaming of his face, I 
thought he surely had been successful. 

^^See the editors!” I asked. 

‘‘No, I put that otf for a day or two, to see if I 
couldn’t land a job.” 

‘ ‘ What did you do ! ” 

“Well, I thought I’d go and see Lee, Hunt and 
Company, and ask Mr. Wilder to place me. ” 

‘ ‘ What did he say ? ’ ’ 

“Oh, I didn’t go yet. I wanted time to think 
it over well first, before I saw him.” 

“And then!” 

“Then I thought I’d go and see if Black 
couldn’t use me on the Illustrated News ” 

“Could he!” 

“I don’t know. Just as I was going down, I 
thought I had better have a couple of those illus- 
trated articles with me, so I put it off till I had 
them along. He’s been pretty busy anyway, 
lately, you know. ’ ’ 

“Well, what in thunder have you been doing!” 

‘ ‘ I met Dorothy, accidentally, and we had lunch 
together. ’ ’ 

“What time did you meet Dorothy so accident- 
ally!” 

“Twelve o’clock.” 

‘ ‘ And just left her ! ’ ’ 

“Yep.” 

‘ ‘ And the restaurant didn ’t charge you rent ! ’ ’ 

We got on the Elevated together, and rode up 
town. The evening paper occupied the half 
hour’s run, and when we were poured out at 
Fifty-Eighth Street, I turned again to Billy. 

“Now you have to work all evening, because 
you loafed all day,” I commanded him. 


75 


“That’s right/’ he assented mildly, “I know I 
ought to. But the truth is, I’ll just have time to 
jump into my clothes, and get up town for din- 
ner.” 

“Billy!” I groaned, “It’s cheaper to do it that 
way, I know, but for the Lord’s sake, wake up and 
build your own nest. Your house of cards’ll col- 
lapse soon.” 

‘ ‘ Oh, that reminds me ! ” he exclaimed, snapping 
his finger. “I forgot it, clean as a whistle. I’m 
to take you up town to dinner to-night. Go jump 
into your togs and get around to my place by six 
o ’clock. ’ ’ 

“You’re joking, Billy.” 

“Indeed I’m not. What did you think I rode 
down town for, just for the pleasure of riding back 
up with you? That is an allurement, I grant you, 
but I didn’t rush out of Sherry’s at four o’clock 
and hustle down town on a stuffy Subway train 
without some extra incentive.” 

“All right,” I echoed, “Six o’clock.” 

Being a fine evening, and the distance short, we 
walked up. Billy always walked, to save the five 
cents it cost to ride, and next morning, invested 
the five cents he had saved, along with numerous 
other nickels that never had had the joyful exper- 
ience of being saved, in a bunch of posies to repre- 
sent him in his Lady’s bower. I soon discovered 
that Billy was not the only one who was in love, 
and in truth I waxed quite jealous. I had too long 
regarded Billy’s atfection as one of my own ex- 
clusive rights and privileges. 

I felt uncomfortable all during the homelike din- 
ner, while Billy was given an opportunity to stow 
away his full quota of rations undisturbed. I do 
not relish the idea of being an interloper, though 
Billy, with a sickening attempt at humor, sought 
to dub me the “star boarder.” I didn’t blame 


76 


him for being sore, when sitting down to the piano 
at our express request after dinner to play to us, 
he looked around a few moments later to find that 
I had run away with his girl. 

But I had use for his girl. 

‘ ‘ What ’s to be done with Billy T ’ I asked. 

^‘Done?” she queried vaguely. ^WVhy, you 
couldn’t be angry with Billy?” 

‘‘Not angry, never,” I assured her. “But I 
feel very much towards Billy as a most loving 
father would feel towards a small son whom he 
found playing hookey. ” 

“He’s not guilty of playing hookey,” she re- 
plied naively, her big brown eyes wide open won- 
deringly. “He’s been here every night.” 

I laughed immoderately at the same childish 
stupidity I was destined to run up against on all 
sides. 

“My dear Dorothy,” said I, “If you will allow 
me to call you so, for Billy is dearer to me than 
any brother could ever be” — ^her winning smile 
was answer enough — “I see I am going to have 
two children to take care of instead of one.” 

‘ ‘ It will be very nice to have a brotherrin-law in 
the family,” she laughed. 

It was deucedly hard to introduce the subject. 
I tried another route, which evidently was mis- 
interpreted. 

“When are you going south, Dorothy?” 

“Oh, I can go any time that there’s a popular 
demand,” she replied. 

“Don’t misunderstand me,” I begged. “But 
critical conditions require heroic measures, you 
know. ’ ’ 

“I don’t know anybody more heroic than 
Billy.” 

“I know Billy far better than you do. Miss 
Lee” — she was becoming frightfully chilly — 


77 


^^and IVe never yet laid down when I oould be 
of any service to him.^’ 

It was here that Billy noticed the aforesaid 
vx)id, and put in an appearance. 

Going home?’^ he demanded, Who’s going 
home?” 

I didn’t feel like answering the question, and 
Miss Lee evidently didn’t care to, whereupon 
Billy acquired quite a rage. 

‘Mf you’re trying to run her home, Joe,” he 
complained, ‘M’m the party you’ll have to settle 
with. ’ ’ 

How I longed for the physical strength to go 
and get my hat and walk out! The situation was 
plain torture, for there was I, aching to help 
them both along, and both of them screwing their 
noses out of joint at my unwelcome interference. 
I sat inertly waiting for something to move. 
But it didn’t. Nothing ever does happen when 
I’m in deep water. So in a prosaic way, I 
looked at my watch, expressed great surprise at 
the time, and prepared to depart. 

^‘You’ll come again, Mr. Corbin, won’t you?” 
said Miss Lee at parting. 

Thank you,” I replied, without a smile I am 
afraid. 

I looked around for Billy, who merely held out 
his hand and said, 

‘‘Good-night, old man.” 

The audacity! I could have run him through 
and seen him fall without a twinge of regret. 

I walked down the Avenue with perhaps the 
most bitter, malicious feeling I have ever been 
guilty of. It is pretty tough to be slapped in the 
face by a man that you love dearly. One nowa- 
days must needs grow callous to the cuts he re- 
ceives for trying to help another along, but to be 


78 


wounded by one for whom he feels deep and true 
affection — that is another and a very sad propo- 
sition. 

I didn’t go to Billy’s that night, for the first 
time in a fortnight. I went home to work myself 
into a perfect fit of despondency. Then, with the 
moral cowardice that came when I feared that 
Billy might drop in and catch me, I turned out 
the lights, and went out into the street. 

I found evidence that he had been there when 
I let myself in long after midnight, but I made 
no move to call him up. Then I wondered who 
was the bigger coward, he or I? No, I refused 
to give in to such base ingratitude, and steeling 
my heart against any soft feelings or show of 
mercy, I dismissed him from my mind and went 
to bed. 

The next day I was down town early. I suppose 
I was afraid Billy would appear again before I 
had time to get away, for I got out of the house 
with a haste most unusual. And somehow I felt 
disappointed when I did not meet him coming in 
at the door as I went out, or on the Elevated 
station, as I watched the early morning pas- 
sengers running for their trains. 

For the next hour, I had not time to remember 
that Billy was on earth. The Street was nervous, 
and the prospect of a big day set everybody on 
edge. So on coming in from the Street about ten 
o’clock, I experienced a vague surprise to find 
a message on my desk which read: ^‘Mr. C. 
wishes Mr. Corbin to lunch with him at three 
forty-five at Sherry’s. Very important.” I 
looked at it fondly with a feeling of relief. I 
would have been pained if it had not come. How- 
ever, as it required no answer, I simply made a 
note of it on my pad, lest I forget it in the stren- 


79 


nous rush of the day, and tossed it into the basket. 
Then I went back to work harder than ever, but 
with a far lighter heart. 

It was about noontime when I came in again, 
and the ever officious office boy planted himself 
in my path with a note. 

^‘Here’s an invitation to lunch, Mr. Corbin,’^ 
he said with superior gravity. 

^‘Mind your business,” I growled, while the 
small boy, not a whit abashed, did a dance to the 
other side of the office, stopping to poke his 
finger down the back of a stenographer's neck, 
at the same time emitting a noise like the pop- 
ping of a cork. 

I pressed inside and put my feet up on the 
desk. The note he had given me read, ‘‘Will Mr. 
Corbin take lunch with Mr. C. at Sherry’s at 
three thirty. Important.” It was a favorite trick 
of telephone girls and office boys to make dupli- 
cate messages and use them for making fun, but 
the difference in time between these two looked 
peculiar. However, I figured out that Billy had 
a reason for summoning me earlier and had so 
advised me. 

Three o ’clock saw me piled sky-high with work, 
and it was twenty minutes of four when I dashed 
into Sherry’s, hot and out of breath. I threw my 
hat at the boy and hastened inside to find — not 
Billy — but Miss Lee, with a childlike smile and 
a hanging head. 

“Will you forgive me, Mr. Corbin?” she asked 
meekly, “for deceiving you?” I had no answer 
ready. “But I knew you would not coine if you 
knew it was I, and I just had to talk to you. ’ ’ 

Next thing in order was a slap on my shoulder 
and a look nearer to fright than to dismay on 
Miss Lee’s face. 


80 


It was Billy. 

‘‘What^s up?’’ he demanded. That’s all he 
could think of. 

I thought I was the goat, Miss Lee had no 
doubt she was, and Billy was sure he was. The 
realization forced me to a conclusion. 

‘^Come along with me,” I said decidedly, and 
out onto the balcony we went, in the farthest 
comer. Like two little lambs they followed me, 
and I distinctly heard Miss Lee say, ^^You surely 
did,” and Billy said, ^‘You must have.” 

I ordered lunch, to get rid of the waiter, and 
turned to the case in point without a quiver. 

“I told you last night. Miss Lee, that critical 
situations demanded heroic measures, so I am 
rather glad you decided to have Billy here.” 

‘‘But I didn’t!” she said pleadingly. “I didn’t 
even know he was coming.” 

‘‘You set up this game, Joe,” retorted Billy. 

‘ ‘ I had no idea she was going to be here. ’ ’ 

It certainly looked dark for me. But by a sys- 
tem of accident insurance I had installed long 
ago — by reason of a very similar occasion to this 
— I had taken the messages from the basket and 
put them into my pocket, whence I now produced 
them. The first was dated “9.45 A. M.” The 
second, “12.05 P. M.” I laid them side by side 
on the table. 

“These,” I declared, “constitute all I know.” 

“I called up at a quarter of ten,” announced 
Billy, “Here’s my message.” 

I saw the flush on her face, but Billy did not, 
and I waited. I longed to refuse to understand, 
as she had refused to understand me last night, 
yet I couldn’t bring myself to it. Billy was 
reading the second message and fingering the 
time mark in the corner. 


81 


i: 


^‘That’s none of mine/’ he declared finally. 

‘^This situation is too ticklish to have any 
secrets,” I said, looking at Miss Lee. ‘M’m the 
one that’s in disrepute here, and I think you all 
ought to clear me.” 

It took a long time, but finally she picked up 
the second message and said faintly, 

”This one was mine.” 

I leisurely lit a cigarette and smoked a butter- 
fly otf a big leaf nearby. 

“Well, all I have to say is this, that great 
minds run in the same channel, and I see now 
that I’m up against a peach of a game.” 

After the food had been pretty well disposed 
of, I brought the conversation round to the rea- 
son for its existence. 

^ ‘ I am in a very bad position in this matter, ’ ’ I 
explained, “and I must first of all insist on cer- 
tain assurances from both of you. First, that 
neither of you will take offense at anything I say, 
misinterpret, or misunderstand. Secondly, that 
you will remember that I love you both as dearly 
as an}^ brother could, and what I do or say is to 
help and not to hurt. Am I to have carte 
hlanchef^^ 

“Yes,” said Billy, resignedly, playing with a 
fork. Billy knew what was coming from experi- 
ence. 

“Yes,” rejoined Miss Lee enthusiastically, 
leaning forward with her face in her hands. 

“My first remark is one that I would not make 
if this strange condition of affairs hadn’t brought 
it about. The truth is. Miss Lee, Billy is a lost 
chord. That chord may have all the trueness, 
the beauty, the far-reaching usefulness of the 
Universe; but it must be capable of being 
harnessed up and made to do its human duty. 


82 


As Billy’s supervisor, I freely admit the respon- 
sibility devolving upon me of locating’ him.” 

Maybe I can assist,” she smiled. 

^‘Not only can you,” I assured her, ^‘but no- 
body else can. I’ve been waiting for you to help 
me do it since away back in the dark ages.” 

Billy hasn’t painted that picture to me,” she 
said. ^‘Give me the circumstances and I’ll 
guarantee to furnish you with an answer.” 

^^Two lawyers and a judge can railroad any 
man to the pen in record time,” put in Billy. 
‘^Can I have first say in this case?” 

^‘Surely,” I granted him, glad to be relieved 
of the duty. 

^‘My faults ” he began. 

False start,” I objected. “If you’re going to 
do it that way. I’ll take it over myself. The fact 
is, Billy, you can’t get married until you have a 
place in the world that the world recognizes. You 
have a wonderful amount of creative and execu- 
tive ability. You have a marvellous memory 
and a talent of getting results from chaotic condi- 
tions in the shortest possible time — except in your 
own case. But you don’t capitalize your time, 
your energy, your memory or any asset you have. 
Why, look around you at the men who are at the 
head of affairs to-day ! They concentrate on their 
business as if it meant certain death to stop for 
a minute. They capitalize their time, their 
money and their opportunities. They even capi- 
talize their enemies, organize them, and have 
them working for them like slaves without their 
knowing who they are working for. You create 
the conditions that cause your own misery. You 
deliver your executive ability to a man that wants 
an office boy, and work like a Trojan for your own 
undoing. Last year you spent enough time on 


83 


those Colonial Statistics to have kept you for life, 
if you had taken some live problem where statis- 
tics are in demand.” 

“Guilty,” he responded morosely. 

“Now to return to the talk of last night, Miss 
Lee, that caused the eruption. Far be it from my 
thoughts to do anything that would separate you 
and Billy, but I felt it critically necessary that 
Billy should intersperse his daily routine of even- 
ing calls and lunches and morning drives with a 
face-to-face contest with the questions that would 
make wedded bliss a reality, but first of all, a 
possibility. When the fence is down, the sheep 
don’t have to jump over it. Billy only needs a 
waking-up. That’s all. Now do you see, and 
will you pardon my apparent intrusion, my re- 
mark of last night I” 

“Yes, and I’ll tell you why it happened so,” 
she said sweetly. “I have been endeavoring to 
go home for two weeks, and have kept putting it 
off from day to day. It was my own thoughts 
more than your words that caused me to speak as 
I did.” 

“When are you coming back?” inquired Billy 
weakly. 

“When you’re ready for me,” she chirped, and 
I saw that she was actually taking my side of the 
case. 

“That sort of puts the bug on me,” he replied. 
“And when have you decided to go?” 

I almost feared I had carried it too far. Billy’s 
remarks and even his voice indicated the vicinity 
of the breaking point, but I had far too much faith 
in Miss Lee to worry about that. 

“I’m going to-morrow, Billy,” she said, sweetly 
but forcibly.” “And when I come back, it will be 
when you come down after me and bring me 
back. ’ ’ 


84 


I gloated over the situation. Billy had a world 
of faith, but now he had to produce a world of 
works. My modus operandi had been cruelly se- 
vere, but it took a whole big avalanche to make 
Billy sit up and take notice. We united in 
taking Miss Lee home, after which I regaled Billy 
with more good free advice. But strangely 
enough, however good free advice may be, it is 
valued exactly at what it costs — ^nothing. 

I had the good sense to leave him after we had 
dined at an obscure little restaurant we had found 
in former days. There was no need to ask where 
he was going. For my part, I was going to some 
place where the lights were bright and the music 
was gay. As I watched the play, I thought how 
much alike they all were ! There were three types, 
to one of which every play belonged. In the first, 
the lovers were kept apart by stern parental ob- 
jection. In the second, by mutual misunderstand- 
ing. In the third class, they werenT sure they 
really wanted each other until they read it in the 
paper. Nowhere could I remember where any 
play had presented two lovers kept apart by pure 
and simple poverty, but who, however, kept it 
from being spotted by a generous supply of bluff. 
Then I wondered if I had said any word to Billy 
and Miss Lee to wound their pride. For every- 
thing else will heal, but wounded pride always 
leaves its scar. 

It was an abject Billy that went to Seventy 
second Street that night. He had felt the first 
real desire of his life, the passion, the craving to 
possess something concrete and real, He had 
leisurely and lazily basked in the sunshine for 
w^hat had been now — it stunned him when he 
realized it — two months. And now that summer 
was drawing to a close, his individual atmosphere 
had a decidedly wintry aspect. 


85 


He almost forgot his troubles in the radiance 
with which she received him. His wounded heart 
took on new hope, but dropped each time he 
thought of the task before him. He had deceived 
her, and he had to confess it! 

Now a woman, if she loves a man, will forgive 
pretty nearly everything. He may neglect her, 
abuse her, desert her, and she bobs up serenely 
and the hole closes up after her. But she has a 
decided aversion to being deceived. And to show 
her sovereign and majestic wrath, it is necessary 
only that she should think she has been deceived. 
That was what made Billy feel like an alternating 
current. He hadnT told her a single thing that 
was untrue, he had not gone even a single step 
out of his way to lead her to see anything different 
from what it actually was ; but it was with growing 
apprehension that he had seen her form her own 
conclusions, decide for herself that he was rich 
and successful, and choose to regard the things 
she heard about him as funny stories. So every 
time that he would calm his beating heart with the 
assurance that it was all right, he would as 
speedily have a chill at realizing that it was all 
wrong. He was face to face with the cold cruel 
fact that he must tell her he was a beggar. 

The story books tell you that they will pass over 
the first few pages, or months or years, because 
they are not material to the story or its interest. 
We, however, will pass over the first few pages, 
minutes or episodes of the evening simply for the 
sake of delicacy, and the fact that Billy and 
Dorothy alone are concerned. And you are right 
in assuming that when this blissful tete-d-tete was 
broken up, it was Dorothy, and not Billy, that 
broke it up. 

“Now, Billy, she said, gently extricating her- 


86 


self from the entwining process, know it isn’t 
pleasant, but I’ve got to talk about going home.” 

Billy squared himself for the inevitable. 

” First,” she confided, ”I have to confess one 
great injustice I have done.” Billy jumped at 
the proverbial straw. was awfully mean to 
Mr. Corbin, and I don’t know what he thinks of 
me. But I want to tell you this one thing, Billy, 
that only one man in a generation has such a friend 
as you have. ’ ’ 

”I’ve soaked him pretty hard, too, I guess,” he 
reflected. 

‘ ‘ But he has shown me what I was too blind to 
see for myself. We must make the best of to-night,. 
Billy. ’ ’ 

Billy saw that his hour had come, so he manfully 
poured out the dose prescribed for a horse and 
swallowed it at a gulp. 

” Little girl,” he said bravely, ”I’ve deceived 
you wretchedly for a long time. Having done so, 
I claim my day in court, the right to fell you the 
whole truth, and then if you want to throw me 
over, that’s your privilege.” 

'‘You may have not told me lots of things,” she 
answered, ^^but I don’t believe you have ever de- 
ceived me.” 

“Yes,” he urged, “I am going to use plain 
words. I have deceived you shamefully. When 
you allowed me to love you, and to expect to marry 
you, it was up to me to make you my confidant and 
tell you my circumstances, my hopes and my 
chances. I didn’t do it, and it’s harder now than 
it would have been then.” 

‘‘I don’t know,” she mused, “how you Northern 
])eople look at those things. We Southerners 
can’t see any connection between a man’s money 
and his love. If he attempted to speak of that 


87 


at home, we wouldn listen to him. That, accord- 
ing to the old-time chivalry, would be a serious 
breach of the conventionalities.’’ 

‘‘Nevertheless,” he urged, ‘T came up to tell 
you all to-night, and if you don’t want to hear it 
as argument, then you must let me tell it to you 
as news.” 

“Billy!” she gasped, “What do 1 care for what 
you have? Do you consider me so mercenary?” 

“My dear little woman,” he smiled, “come sit 
down here beside me and let me tell you a story. 
What’s mine is yours, and what’s yours is mine. 
Is that right?” 

‘ ‘ Certainly. ’ ’ 

“Well, I haven’t got anything.” 

She thought he surely must be joking, for if any 
man had paraded up and down the land before her 
as a man far above the dangerous shoals of want, 
Billy had. But having decided to hear his story 
as “news,” she smiled and waited. 

“No, Dorothy,” he continued seriously, “I 
haven’t a red cent in the world. I have a bully 
lot of excuses to satisfy myself for that condition, 
but they ’re not worth much to anybody else. The 
boy that got licked for telling the truth felt the 
smart just as keenly as the boy that got licked for 
telling a lie. So whatever I may think of my own 
('ase, the fact remains that you are expecting a 
man to marry you who is a pauper. ’ ’ 

“For shame, Billy!” she cried, belying the 
words by giving him an affectionate caress. “How 
dare you use such words as those about a man I 
love?” 

‘ ‘ I got a wrong impression, ’ ’ he went on, ‘ ‘ during 
mj^ college days and the ones that came just after. 
1 thought large fortunes were easy to make 
cjuickly, and I could get mine for the asking. And 
I still think I would have had it long ago had I 


88 


been willing to practice the methods I would have 
to use to do it. But I know that you would 
rather have me come to you with clean hands and 
poor.’^ 

‘‘A thousand times she cried. She hugged 
him mutely, and then in somewhat doleful tones, 
she mused, 

‘‘Well, I guess it means that we ^11 have to wait 
a little longer than we thought, that^s all. When 
I go home, I know you ’ll go to work in earnest. ’ ’ 

“ By Heaven, Dorothy ! ” he announced forcibly, 
“I’ll come and get you before Christmas.” 

He didn’t tell me what occurred there in the 
gloaming after that, and if it’s none of my busi- 
ness, I am sure it’s none of yours. 


VI. 


She went away next day. It was a holiday, so 
boys and girls alike went down to the steamer to 
see her off, for she had decided to go south by the 
ocean route. It struck me as ridiculously true 
that nobody seemed to be sorry for Billy, but that 
they all shed tears of sympathy over the vanish- 
ing Miss Lee. Long since, I have become con- 
vinced that they were selfish tears at losing a 
coveted posy. Miss Lee had truly won a place in 
all our hearts. 

1 waited the best part of a week before I at- 
tempted to draw Billy out or to spur him on. I 
was sure that Doroithy’s influence and wishes 
would prove more inspiring far, than could any of 
mine. Accordingly, I was amused as well as 
somewhat surprised when Billy turned up the 
following Sunday morning with a freshness and 
exhilaration that was altogether new. 

“Come out to breakfast, Joe,” he said, “And 
then wedl go to church somewhere.” 

“Reformed at last!” 

“Yes,” he admitted, smilingly, “I promised 
her. I feel lots better too, for I was brought up 
to it, and I always feel guilty when I desecrate a 
Sunday. ’ ^ 

Little by little, he exhibited signs of a new life. 
No mitred Bishop could have held down the end 
of the pew there with more accustomed dignity, 
no lusty choir-boy could have joined more jubil- 
antly in the familiar hymns. The only improve- 
ment, I knew, would have been to have Dorothy 
there beside him instead of me. And how unsel- 
fishly I would have made the change I 

The falling leaves and the autumn breeze made 
an ideal day to walk, and all through the long 


90 


afternoon we tramped through forests where the 
rustle of dead leaves was disturbed only by dis- 
tant echoes. To me it brought the thought of a 
summer full of happiness drawing to a close; of 
a winter coming on full of activity and promise. 
To Billy it bore resemblance to the passing of an 
old regime that teemed with homely memories and 
cherished ties, and the advent of a new era of suc- 
cess and progress. 

“1 have a surprise for you, old man,’’ he said 
as we sat down together on a fallen log. 

“Good!” I exclaimed. 

“I am employed by the Pacific Securities Com- 
pany at thirty dollars a week to start.” 

“Not really, Billy?” I gasped. 

“Sure thing!” 

“Splendid !” 

“And I have another.” 

“Yes?” 

“Parkman’s Magazine has accepted that article • 
of mine on the Constitution for five hundred dol- 
lars, payable the first of the month.” 

‘ ‘ Billy ! ” I cried, lumping up to grasp his hand, 
“How did you do it?” 

“That’s not all. They have ordered six more, 
since they have seen that old outline I have 
shown you a hundred times.” 

I laughed aloud in ecstasy of glee. 

“When does the wedding come oif?” I asked. 

“Christmas, at this rate.” 

It was a regenerated Billy after that. I saw 
liim often in the morning when I went down town 
earlier than was my custom, and always at night. 

I saw that these long night sessions were drawing 
to a close. He had lost the old shiftless, lethargic 
way, and had forever left the line of least re- 
sistance. In fact, I found it rather hard to keep 
up with him. One night I asked him to tell me 


91 


the secret. He leaned over the table and spoke 
very seriously. 

“Do you remember the night you left Dorothy’s 
and went home, Joe?” — Could I ever forget it! — 
“I went to find you that night when I left her. 
You were not at home, and I turned up the lights 
and looked aimlessly about. On your table was a 
book which I opened, and read the following ad- 
vice of Bismarck: — ‘To youth I have but three 
words of counsel — Work, work, work.’ I read it, 
I guess, a dozen times, and then I sat down and 
thought it over. How often I had pictured myself 
on far loftier heights than ever Bismarck attained, 
with the insane idea, I suppose, that some morn- 
ing I would wake up and find myself there! I 
reached over and picked up another book, and 
opened it to a verse of Longfellows : 


‘The heights by great men reached and kept 
Were not attained by sudden flight; 

But they, while their companions slept, 

Were toiling upwards in the night.’ 

I saw clearly that I didn’t have any more right 
to expect to attain my bursts of fancy than a 
rabbit, so I knelt down there and took a solemn 
oath that I would ‘Work, work, work.’ It would 
have been far different if Dorothy hadn’t mixed 
it up next day with that telephone message.” 

“Better as it was,” I hazarded. 

“Maybe so. But I wasted no time in putting 
my VOW into operation. How many times I have 
planned to do this thing and that, follow up 
opportuniities and push myself ahead, and then 
serenely let things glide by without ever once 
trying! How I lied about having made great 
efforts ! But I have wakened up now,” he smiled, 
“Aud the world shall hear from me.” 

The next issue of Parkman’s Magazine gave 
me a thrill of pure joy. Billy had at last broken 


92 


into print ! It was an announcement of an article 
that woudd be presented next month, ^ ^ of wonder- 
ful value to the Historian, and an invaluable aid 
to present-day government/’ It displayed a 
Napoleonic photograph of Billy to an anxiously 
waiting world, and assured its readers that the 
^‘discovery” of Mr. Carrolton marked a new era 
in the life of the Magazine. 

The congratulations and the well- wishes dem- 
onstrated fully what the world thinks of a suc- 
cess. The day of celebrations had gone by — at 
least, the variety of celebrations Billy had in- 
dulged in. He realized how utterly the world has 
no use for a failure, and though he put on no 
airs, he carried his late honors with a new-born 
dignity. 

And how that boy did learn to save! It had 
always been an open joke how fast money had 
burned a hole in his pocket, but now that he had 
taken his heart otf his sleeve, it may be that he 
put it in his pocket, so that it effectually stopped 
up the hole. At any rate, old Solomon received 
notice that he could let his apartments elsewhere 
after the first of the year, and notwithstanding 
his many long forbearances and frequent forlorn 
hopes, he made a. personal call to lament his loss. 
Even the ins^urance policy was saved, and a nest- 
egg thus provided for any untoward fate that 
might turn the not-yet-married Dorothy into a 
bewitching widow. 

On Thanksgiving night, ten men sat around the 
table in Sherry’s, where each had done similar 
service many times before, as one by one, the 
mountain lions had been trapped to do duty as a 
household pet. Such occasions are usually hilar- 
ious. In fact, they very much resemble a wake 
that spontaneously takes place in the vicinity of 


93 


a lingering departing spirit. This was not mi- 
like a wake. 

The ten were bound by every tie that makes 
men dear to each other. But I am sure that the 
tie of each to Billy was stronger than any other. 
He seemed to me to tower above any other man 
I had ever known; to be, though poor, richer 
than any other man that lives; though so long 
apparently a failure, yet inherently a signal suc- 
cess when the time came to wear the crown. 

‘‘Boys,” he said tenderly when the time had 
come to say the real farewell, “God has been 
good to me. I wish you all might know and feel 
what I know and feel, as I go from the old sphere 
of life to-night to take up the new. IVe always 
had a bountiful supply of faith, and my faith has 
never been disappointed in you men that I have 
known, and loved and trusted. I wish each one 
of you could know the value you have been to me 
in keeping my life filled with healthy interest and 
high resolve, keeping me from any danger of 
drifting into the sordid, or into the insidious 
traps that friends of yours and mine have fallen 
by. And it is my highest pleasure that our real 
friendship has but just begun. That here among 
you I am going henceforth to have a home in 
which you all shall come and go as the dear old 
pals you have all been to me. We will all meet 
again, boys, around my table on Christmas day, 
just we, and one other.” 

They stood, and in silence drank the toast to 
Dorothy. 

“And now, farewell. And remember when you 
hear the sleigh-bells, 'that they^re Billy Carrol- 
ton’s wedding bells.” 







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